Southern  Branch 
of  the 


University  of  California 


Los  Angeles 


Form  L  I 


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STATF  NORMAL  SCHOOL, 

Us  Arrgefes.  Cal. 


-•A  ;-. 


SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS 


BY 


ESTHER  BERNON   CARPENTER 

7** 


BOSTON 
ROBERTS      BROTHERS 

1887 


Copyright,  1887, 

BY  ROBERTS  BROTHERS. 


dnibfrsito 
JOHN  WILSON  AND  SON,  CAMBRIDGE. 


F  s 
^  5 


TO 

OLIVER    WENDELL    HOLMES, 

MY  EARLIEST  AND  LATEST  MASTER, 

I  Drttcate 

T.H  IS     BOOK. 


PREFACE. 


THE  busy  life  of  the  South  County  of  to-day 
still  keeps  certain  wholesomely  rustic 
phases  of  its  leisurely  yesterday.  But  in  choos 
ing  the  subjects  of  my  character-studies  I 
have  generally  preferred  to  set  back  the  hands 
of  the  town-clocks  until  they  pointed  to  the 
time  of  forty  or  fifty  years  ago,  when  every 
body's  hobby  was  ridden  bare-backed,  and  when 
freaks  and  oddities  of  individuality  flourished 
unchecked  by  an  upstart  civilization. 

In  those  generous  days  the  bucolic  and  sea 
faring  types  ran  to  a  luxuriant  growth.  The  in 
formal  club  of  rural  fellowship  met  at  the  country 
store,  where  the  talk  flowed  in  a  vein  of  wise 
acre  moralizing,  or  of  delicious  inconsequence, 
and  the  season  of  expansion  was  equally  im 
proved  by  the  talkers,  the  listeners,  and  by 
those  no  less  sincere  seekers  after  social  in 
fluences  who  yet  remained  among  the  inarticu 
late  intelligences,  and  dwelt  in  a  contemplation 


VI  PREFACE. 

which  seemed  to  yield  the  fruits  of  a  Yankee 
Nirvana. 

Loitering  on  the  highway,  or  sharing  the 
charitable  hospitality  of  the  farmhouse,  came 
and  went  "  all  the  vagrant  train "  that  were 
known  to  the  hamlet  of  Lissoy.  The  classi 
cally  familiar  figures  of  "the  aged  beggar," 
"  the  broken  soldier,"  or  "  the  ruined  spend 
thrift,"  appeared  by  their  New  England  repre 
sentatives, —  such  as  infirm-witted  "old  travel 
lers,"  waifs  from  the  War  of  1812,  and  blighted 
scions  of  good  families. 

All  roads  ranged  by  these  picturesque  origi 
nals  led  to  the  "  town-farm,"  where  they  were  as 
rudely  assorted  and  classified  as  any  set  of 
grotesquely-carved  and  half-broken  toys  that 
are  hastily  crowded  into  a  box.  Here  were 
types  of  no  distant  kindred  to  those  of  the  rural 
almshouse  of  Crabbe,  or  the  gathering  of  "  ran- 
die,  gangrel  bodies  "  at  Poosie  Nancy's ;  and  all 
were  thoughtfully  grouped  by  the  village  fathers 
into  a  kind  of  Conservatory  of  Outlawry. 

Such  were  some  of  the  primitive  elements 
entering  into  the  life  of  those  country  "  Neigh 
bors  "  whose  traits  I  have  slightly  indicated. 

I  have  so  entitled  my  book  not  only  from  the 
universal  neighborliness  of  country  people,  but 
because  this  title  of  "  neighbor  "  has  been  com 
monly  used  among  us  with  a  scope  of  expres 
sion  which  makes  it  the  equivalent  of  the 


PREFACE.  vii 

Western  "  stranger,"  as  a  genial  and  conciliatory 
form  of  address,  suiting  either  the  oldest  ac 
quaintance  or  the  latest  comer. 

Those  who  best  know  our  Narragansett 
country,  and  have  already  become  familiar  with 
these  "  South-County  Folks  "  as  they  made  their 
occasional  appearances  in  the  "  Providence  Jour 
nal  "will  least  need  the  assurance  that  the  figures 
of  my  studies  are  simply  types,  rather  than 
likenesses.  To  others  —  to  those  present  stran 
gers  in  whom  every  writer  anxiously  hopes  to 
find  future  friends,  —  I  can  only  commend  my 
people  for  the  sake  of  that  reality  in  the  power 
of  which  they  lived  and  moved  in  my  conscious 
ness,  so  that  I  looked  into  their  faces,  heard 
their  voices,  and  knew  no  rest  from  these  per 
sistent  guests  until  I  had  suffered  them  to  tell 
their  stories. 

WAKEFIELD,  WASHINGTON  COUNTY, 
RHODE  ISLAND,  May  10,  1887. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

SALLY  OF  THE  SOUTH  COUNTY u 

"  WHEN  MY  SHIP  COMES  IN  " 24 

AT  A  SHEEP-WASHING 41 

AlLSE   CONGDON 59 

AN  AFTERNOON  AT  NEIGHBOR  NORTHUP'S     .    .  73 

FROM  HOUR  TO  HOUR  IN  THE  COUNTRY  STORE  87 

EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE  'SiAs's    ....  115 

WATCHING  WITH  THE  SICK 139 

JACKSON  DAWLE/VT'S  WIFE .  182 

PRISCILLA  GALLAGHAN 223 

* 

L.  C .251 


SOUTH -COUNTY  NEIGHBOR. 

* 


SALLY  OF  THE  SOUTH  COUNTY. 

NO  maiden  of  ballad  romance  was  she,  but 
simply  our  ancient  Yankee  maid-of-all- 
work,  —  a  "  help  "  of  the  old-fashioned,  pains 
taking  sort,  who  gave  herself  to  the  household 
routine  with  an  unflagging  zeal  and  energy. 
She  was  a  natural  ascetic  (if  that  is  not  a  con 
tradiction  in  terms),  a  rigid  economist,  and 
though  the  kitchen  over  which  she  presided  as 
tutelary  deity  was  always  filled  with  the  smoke 
and  steam  of  sacrifice,  she  conscientiously  con 
sumed  her  failures  in  cookery,  —  invariably 
making  choice,  for  her  own  meals,  of  the  burnt 
johnny-cake  and  the  "  slack-baked "  bread. 
When  remonstrated  with,  she  generally  indulged 
in  the  terse  reply  that  "wicked  waste  makes 
woeful  want." 

One  of  my  most  characteristic  recollections  of 
Sally  dimly  shows  her  wrapped  in  the  incense 
arising  from  a  frying-pan  of  doughnuts,  while 
she  served  as  a  grim  target  for  the  pleasantries 


12  SOUTH -COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

of  the  village  doctor,  who  never  omitted  her  in 
his  visits  to  the  house,  always  having  the  same 
time-worn  jest  to  proffer  anent  some  very  recent 
widower,  or  some  particularly  aged  and  forlorn 
bachelor  swain,  to  whom  he  was  about  to  re 
commend  her  as  a  housekeeper.  To  what  phase 
of  even  a  middle-aged  vanity  these  railleries 
could  possibly  minister  is  now,  as  then,  a  mys 
tery  ;  but  if  the  doctor's  jokes  could  hardly  be 
counted  as  instances  of  delicate  homage,  grace 
ful  attention,  or  well-turned  compliment,  I 
suppose  that  at  least  they  stood  as  the  equiv 
alents  of  those  unknown  quantities  in  the  life 
of  Sally. 

As  to  my  knowledge  of  Sally,  however,  I  can 
not  boast  of  any  nearer  acquaintance  with  her 
than  that  of  being  received  on  what  I  may  call 
the  frigid  and  precarious  terms  of  a  tolerated  in 
timacy.  I  was  naturally  much  attached  to  her 
society  and  her  doughnuts,  and  though,  in  her 
own  vigorous  language,  she  "would  n't  have  chil 
dren  always  'round  underfoot,"  she  consoled  me 
with  dazzling  promises  which  soothed  my  simple 
credulity  with  anticipations  of  a  visit  we  should 
make  to  a  metropolis  known  to  me,  by  ear,  un 
der  the  phonetic  formula  of  "  Branzinewuks,"  but 
which  I  have  since  found  to  be  absurdly  written 
Brand's  Iron  Works.  This  youthful  vision  was 
never  realized,  and  I  fear  that  I  must  some  day 
make  my  own  the  lament  of  the  aged  peasant 


SALLY  OF  THE   SOUTH   COUNTY.  13 

who  was  never  able  to  accomplish  the  cherished 
wish  of  his  life,  in  visiting  the  capital  of  his  native 
province. 

"  Oh  !  fate  is  spun  and  life  is  run, 
And  I  have  not  seen  Carcassonne ;  " 

for,  as  the  poet  of  this  lyric  muses,  — 

"  Each  mortal  has  his  Carcassonne." 

But  I  sometimes  went  with  Sally  to  attend  the 
funerals  of  the  neighbors.  Seen  from  our  post 
of  observation,  as  humble  and  unrelated  sym 
pathizers,  they  were  occasions  of  solemn  agita 
tion  and  subdued  bustle.  The  collection  of 
"  teams "  in  the  door-yard,  the  horses  being 
taken  out  of  the  shafts  and  tied,  suggested  the 
same  signs  of  a  gathering  crowd  at  an  auction. 
Women  and  children  filled  the  rooms ;  the  men 
were  chiefly  grouped  in  the  entries,  looking  in 
at  the  windows,  or  standing  by  the  door.  The 
outward  tokens  of  woe  in  dress  or  otherwise 
were  few  or  none.  There  was  no  music,  and 
there  were  no  flowers,  except  in  the  small  nose 
gays  carried  by  some  of  the  nervous  women,  as 
rustic  substitutes  for  the  vinaigrette  of  fashion, 
and  made  up  of"  lemon  balm,"  with  "  boys'  love" 
and  lavender,  or  perhaps  a  sprig  of  sweet  basil, 
according  to  choice.  The  smell  of  varnish  from 
the  newly-made,  freshly-stained  pine  coffin  was 
penetrating.  So  was  the  voice  of  the  exhorter, 
as  from  his  station  behind  the  light-stand,  on 


14  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

which  was  placed  a  large  Bible,  he,  for  an  hour 
or  more,  continued  to  "  improve  the  occasion," 
and  if  successful,  was  approved  as  having  said 
everything  he  could  to  "  harrow  up  the  feel 
ings  "  of  any  persons  who  might  be  supposed 
insensible  to  the  teachings  of  death;  the  whole 
closing  with  a  prayer,  in  which  every  relative  of 
the  deceased,  present  or  absent,  must  be  remem 
bered,  or  lasting  offence  would  be  given.  Then 
the  undertaker  rose  to  say  that  an  opportunity 
would  now  be  offered  for  the  relations  and 
friends  of  the  corpse  to  take  a  last  parting  look. 
This  was  a  long  ceremony,  beginning  with  the 
leave-taking  of  the  family;  but  at  last  all  the 
distant  acquaintances,  the  slow-moving  old  folk, 
and  the  young  mothers,  with  little  children  in 
their  arms,  had  made  theic.  deliberate  way 
through  the  room,  and  the  neighbors  who  acted 
as  bearers  removed  the  coffin,  first  with  a  matter- 
of-fact  coolness  placing  their  hats  upon  it,  after 
the  lid  had  been  audibly  screwed  down  by  the 
undertaker  in  the  stern  and  uncompromising 
old  way.  These  good,  severe  people  tasted 
griefs  more  thoroughly  than  joys,  and  would 
have  held  it  unrighteous  to  abate  one  jot  or  one 
tittle  of  the  salutary  dread  to  be  inspired  by  the 
scene.  One  of  the  early  departures  from  this 
general  law,  the  innovation  of  replacing  the 
shroud  by  the  ordinary  dress,  was  at  first  re 
garded  as  an  impiety.  It  obviously  impaired 


SALLY   OF  THE   SOUTH   COUNTY.  15     ?4[  StfflMf 

Los  Angd^  Q  , 
the  force  of  allusion  in  such  a  remonstrance  as' 

that  addressed  by  the  aged  Quaker  preacher  to 
the  young  girl  who  was  learning  a  worldly  art 
of  needlework :   "  Dorothy,  thee  won't  need  any 
lace   to  be  laid  out   in;  "    to  which  she   fear 
lessly   replied,   with  a   touch   of  that   spiritual 
wisdom  which  belongs   to  babes:    "No,  Aunt 
Huldy;   but  I  sha'n't  need  any  Quaker  bonnet, 
either."    And  now  the  neighbor  who,  with  much 
busy  self-importance,    "  managed    the  funeral," 
under  a  request  from  the  family  which  carried 
all  the  honor  of  a  high  compliment,  standing  in 
the   doorway,    read   the   names   of  the   related 
families,  according  to  a  jealously-arranged  order 
of  precedence.     The  remains  were  conveyed  in 
a  farm-wagon ;  the  procession  walked  the  short 
distance  to  the  spot  of  interment  on  the  land  of 
the    deceased,    uninclosed     it    might    be,    and 
almost  certainly  containing  graves  as  yet  un 
marked  by  stones.     Very  young  children  often 
failed  to  receive  such  memorials.     No  services 
were  held  at  the  grave,  as  such  an  observance 
would  have  savored  too  strongly  of  the  super 
stition    of  priestly  rites ;   and    few    heads   were 
uncovered ;    but  the  elder  discharged  the  duty 
of  publicly  inviting  the  bearers  to  dinner;   and 
other  friends  were  less  formally  bidden  to  the 
funeral  feast.     So,  with  a  strange  mingling   of 
the  gloomy  and  the  abhorrent,  of  the  tasteless 
and  the  grotesque,  of  the  sympathetic  and  the 


1 6  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

matter-of-fact  in  the  customs  of  the  scene,  we 
buried  our  old  neighbor. 

Sally  was  not  a  regular  attendant  at  any  meet 
ing,  and  if  she  had  ever  paid  homage  to  any 
personal  ideals,  they  were  not  found  among  the 
ciders,  whom  she  was  accustomed  to  satirize, — 
especially  one  of  these  sons  of  thunder,  as  his 
flock  had  once  delighted  to  call  him,  but  of 
whom  she  gave  a  very  trenchant  account  on 
her  return  from  his  preaching.  He  brought  the 
habits  of  his  week-day  labors  into  the  sanctuary, 
and  the  better  to  excel  in  his  fervid  style  of 
oratory,  took  off  his  coat  and  mounted  the  pul 
pit  in  the  costume  of  the  hayfield.  A  division 
had  appeared  in  his  church,  and  his  popularity 
was  waning.  Breathing  out  thrcatenings  and 
slaughter,  like  Saul,  against  the  disturbers  of 
his  peace,  he  finally  abandoned  the  ground  of 
Scriptural  warning,  falling  into  the  anti-climax 
of  quoting  the  language  of  revolutionary  min 
strelsy.  The  well-to-do  farmers  of  his  church 
who  were  in  opposition  to  him  were  indicated 
under  these  poetic  figures :  — 

"  There  is  a  wealthy  people, 

Who  sojourn  in  that  land; 
Their  churches,  all  with  steeples, 

Most  delicately  stand. 
Their  houses,  like  the  gilly, 

Are  painted  red  and  gay; 
They  flourish  like  the  lily, 

In  North  America." 


SALLY  OF  THE   SOUTH   COUNTY.  I/ 

And  in  pointed  attack  upon  the  church  coun 
cil  which  was  soon  to  sit,  and  from  which  he 
expected  hostilities,  he  closed  with  a  vigorous 
application  of  the  colonial  menace :  — 

"  Ye  Parliament  of  England, 

And  Lords  and  Commons  too, 
Consider  well  what  you  're  about, 
And  what  you  mean  to  do  !  " 

These  apt  quotations  are  partly  drawn  from 
the  popular  verses  on  "  American  Taxation," 
written  by  a  Connecticut  schoolmaster,  and  long 
since  enrolled  among  the  curiosities  of  our 
literature. 

As  I  said,  Sally  was  not  very  desirous  of  my 
company,  unless,  indeed,  I  could  be  more  like  a 
certain  little  sister  of  hers, — whom  I  deemed 
fabulous,  but  who  in  Sally's  recital  loved  to  wipe 
dishes,  and  to  sew  her  "  stent,"  and  who  had 
pieced  out  a  counterpane  of  five  hundred  blocks 
when  she  died,  aged  seven.  But  on  Seventh 
Day  (for  Sally's  early  habits  had  been  formed 
by  the  Sabbatic  sect),  or  in  seasons  of  afternoon 
leisure,  I  was  allowed  in  her  room,  and  could 
attend  what  might  be  called  her  levte  en  prin- 
cesse.  At  any  rate,  .it  was  her  time  for  changing 
her  calico  gown  for  a  delaine  one.  Her  sharp, 
decisive,  angular  movements  were  never  more 
appalling  than  in  that  part  of  her  toilette  which 
consisted  in  laying  violent  hands-  on  her  hair. 
We  know  from  poetry,  rather  better  than  from 


1 8  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

observation,  how  charming  a  sight  it  is  when 
Inez  unbinds  her  dark  tresses,  and  they  fall 
about  her  in  a  shadowy  eclipse,  until  the  arrowy 
comb  divides  the  flow  of  the  sable  river,  and  the 
straight  white  parting  gleams  upon  it,  "  one 
moonbeam  from  the  forehead  to  the  crown." 
But  such  was  not  precisely  the  picture  suggested 
by  the  excellent  Sally  as  she  stood  ruthlessly 
grasping  her  rather  harsh  hair,  while  seizing 
upon  some  hairpins  of  giant  stature,  and  of  firm 
and  resolute  aspect,  which  she  adjusted  with  the 
air  of  a  carpenter  at  his  nail-driving,  crowning 
the  whole  with  the  huge  square-topped  horn 
comb  which  was  coeval  with  her  youth.  The 
finished  result  gave  the  damsel  a  somewhat  for 
bidding  appearance,  and  was  painfully  sugges 
tive  of  an  inability  to  close  her  eyes.  I  do  not 
remember  that  Sally  ever  went  through  this 
beautifying  process  without  inveighing  against 
the  modern  extravagance  of  using  hairpins.  In 
her  early  days  she  had  been  well  suited  with  the 
thorns  of  the  locust  tree,  or  those  of  the  haw 
thorn  ;  and  she  was  also  a  stickler  for  the  merits 
of  the  garb  of  her  girlhood,  the  long-unused 
"petticoat  and  cooler,"  or.  short  sack,  which 
made  up  the  nearest  approach  to  a  peasant  cos 
tume  that  was  ever  worn  by  Yankee  girls.  Yet 
some  slight  tokens  of  vanity  Sally  still  retained. 
She  wore  in  her  ears  the  thin  gold  hoops  that 
had  been  the  work, of  her  brother,  a  jeweller's 


SALLY   OF  THE   SOUTH   COUNTY.  1 9 

apprentice;  and  in  her  less  disapproving  moods 
she  would  display  to  me  the  unsunned  glories  of 
that  impressive  structure  of  black  silk,  decked 
with  a  bunch  of  fiercely  blushing  cherries,  which 
for  the  last  ten  years  had  held  the  prestige  of 
being  her  best  bonnet. 

The  library  which  sufficed  for  her  mental 
needs  consisted  of  a  certain  fetich,  carefully  pre 
served  under  the  title  of  the  Good  Book,  with 
the  town  tax-book,  and  by  way  of  light  litera 
ture,  a  pious  tract  describing  the  sufferings  and 
deaths  of  the  successive  Mrs.  Adoniram  Judsons. 
Sally  had  a  numerous  acquaintance  among  the 
Second  Adventists  and  the  Millerites,  but  they 
had  never  been  able  to  impart  any  touch  of  their 
dangerous  enthusiasm  to  her  dry  and  self-con 
tained  nature.  With  matter-of-fact  composure, 
or  with  grim  humor,  she  detailed  the  particulars 
of  their  several  disappointments  in  the  time  of 
the  dissolution  of  our  planet,  and  in  the  fit  of 
their  ascension-robes.  Indeed,  I  never  heard 
her  commit  herself  to  any  profession  of  religious 
faith,  unless  the  occasional  expression  of  a  con 
servative  confidence  in  the  efficiency  of  "  them 
that  rules  all  things  "  may  be  regarded  as  such. 
Like  George  Eliot's  Dolly  Winthrop,  she  invari 
ably  referred  to  the  heavenly  powers  by  darkly 
remote  plural  pronouns.  She  sometimes  had 
me  read  the  Bible  to  her,  while  she  pursued  her 
stated  Sunday  occupation  of",  putting  to  rights" 


I 

20  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

her  chest  of  drawers.  She  rarely  indicated  any 
choice  of  chapters.  It  was  all  good,  she  would 
say  in  a  tone  of  didactic  reproof  at  any  proposal 
of  selection ;  but  I  think  she  inclined  to  the  in 
tricate  style  of  Saint  Paul,  and  our  readings  were 
frequently  from  Romans.  With  greater  zest, 
however,  she  scanned  the  tax-book,  of  which 
she  was  an  annual  recipient,  as  she  proudly  paid 
a  tax  of  one  dollar  and  a  quarter  on  her  maternal 
homestead,  a  fragment  of  a  house,  as  dilapidated 
as  any  old  hat  thrown  away  by  the  roadside,  and 
out  of  the  broken  windows  of  which  popped  the 
heads  of  negro  children  as  you  went  by.  Sally's 
ancient  father,  who  lived  with  a  married  daugh 
ter,  had  been  a  soldier  in  the  War  of  1812,  and  by 
all  his  acquaintances  was  scrupulously  addressed 
by  the  brevet  title  of  General.  His  military 
training  had  certainly  taught  him  to  obey,  for 
he  was  domineered  over  by  every  inmate  of  the 
house,  down  to  his  youngest  granddaughter, 
who  was  Sally's  especial  aversion.  "  That  thcre^ 
gal's  as  spry  as  a  kildee,"  was  his  delighted 
boast,  provoking  thereby  a  scornful  sniff  from 
Sally,  who  hated  all  praises,  and  the  withering 
remark  that  she  was  a  sight  smarter  to  play  than 
what  she  was  to  work.  "  Come,  come,  Sarai," 
the  indulgent  old  grandsire  pleaded,  "she  ain't 
but  a  little  mite  of  a  gal."  I  have  heard  many 
more  impressive  remarks  since,  but  few,  I  think, 
that  have  left  a  pleasanter  memory  of  the  sim- 


SALLY   OF  THE   SOUTH   COUNTY.  21 

plicity  of  human  kindness  than  these  words  of 
the  old  man,  who  was  in  what  Dr.  Holmes  calls 
the  saccharine  stage  of  life,  when  the  temper 
overflows  in  sweetness  at  a  touch,  as  the  maple 
tree  yields  its  sugar  on  being  tapped.  I  am 
afraid  it  is  not  an  experience  of  every  life. 

Sally  was  wont  to  refresh  herself,  while  knit 
ting  in  her  own  room,  by  singing,  in  a  voice  which 
I  hope  had  known  better  days,  such  edifying 
snatches  of  hymnody  as  — 

"  Oh  !  won't  we  have  a  happy  time, 

When  we  arrive  at  home  ; 
A-eating  honey  and  a-drinking  wine, 
When  we  arrive  at  home  ! " 

Somehow  I  could  not  fancy  Sally  as  anything 
but  an  incongruous  figure  at  a  banquet;  and  I 
knew  she  had  a  mortal  antipathy  to  honey;  but 
that  seemed  not  in  the  least  to  detract  from  the 
zest  with  which  she  continued  to  make  merry  in 
her  spiritual  song. 

"Sally,  when  will  they  arrive  at  home? "I 
finally  propounded. 

"What  say,  darter?" 

This  was  an  unusually  affectionate  form  of  ad 
dress  from  Sally,  but  I  suppose  she  was  mol 
lified  by  the  enlivening  imagery  of  her  sacred 
ditty. 

"  I  want  to  know  when  they  will  get  home." 

"  Why  they  'm  all  coming  back,  to  reign  a 
thousand  years." 


22  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"  Shall  we  be  here  then,  Sally?  " 

"  Land  o'  cakes  !  yes,  child.  \Vc  'm  the  wicked, 
'n'  the  wicked  has  all  got  to  be  burnt  up,  you 
know ;  'n'  we  shall  be  ashes  under  the  soles  of  the 
feet  of  the  righteous  in  them  days  —  by  their  tell. 
I  d'n  know  's  I  know,  "  pursued  Sally.  "  Some 
folks  talks  one  way,  'n'  some  another,"  she 
concluded  dispassionately,  settling  her  knitting- 
sheath  for  another  bout,  and  drawing  on  the  ball 
of  yarn  which  she  kept  in  the  large  old-fashioned 
pocket  of  woollen  stuff  which  always  hung  at  her 
waist,  as  a  survival  of  the  half-colonial  dress  of 
her  early  days. 

I  have  since  renewed  my  acquaintance  with 
Sally's  camp-meeting  chorus,  or  with  strains  not 
unlike  it,  in  the  stories  of  Miss  Prescott,  who  as 
sociated  them  with  a  Christian  society  of  high 
repute  for  devotional  fervor  and  missionary  zeal. 
Similar  instances  of  a  graceful  unbending  on  the 
part  of  the  saints  may  be  studied  in  that  curi 
ous  collection  of  the  favorite  New-Light  tunes, 
with  other  psalmody  of  the  South  County,  pub 
lished  under  the  title  of  the  "  Bible  Harp." 

I  regret  to  say  that  an  estrangement  finally 
occurred  between  Sally  and  myself.  The  friend 
ship  which  had  borne  the  strain  of  pronounced 
theological  differences  could  not  outlast  the  or 
deal  of  political  bitterness.  We  were  divided  in 
opinion  upon  the  merits  of  the  Presidential 
candidates.  Sally  was  naturally  a  supporter  of 


SALLY   OF    THE   SOUTH   COUNTY.  23 

a  certain  "  old  Bluecannon,"  as  he  was  seriously 
known,  not  only  in  our  nursery  politics,  but 
among  his  partisans  of  the  circle  at  the  village 
store.  I  suppose  I  thought  him  little  better 
than  Bluebeard.  I  could  not  attend  the  flag- 
raising,  as  it  was  no  more  suitable  an  occasion 
for  the  appearance  of  pretty-behaved  little  girls 
than  the  circus  itself;  but  my  cousins  had  faith 
fully  drilled  me  in  their  frantic  war-whoop  of 
"  Fremont  and  Freedom  !  Jessie  and  the  Union  !" 
and  we  dinned  it  in  the  ears  of  our  elders  until, 
as  I  almost  think,  their  cherished  Republican 
principles  trembled  to  the  foundations. 

Poor  dear  Sally,  how  good  you  were,  in  your 
way,  and  what  an  unlovely  way  it  was  !  but  the 
last  word  now  spoken  of  you  shall  be  the  frank 
confession  that  your  young  companion  of  those 
days  would  have  done  well  if  she  had  studied 
the  example  afforded  by  the  rude  strength  of  a 
nature  that  was  generous  in  deeds  of  diligent 
service,  if  it  neither  asked  nor  bestowed  the  im 
palpable  gifts  of  the  less  practical  forms  of  daily 
benevolence. 


"WHEN   MY  SHIP  COMES  IN." 

BUT  before  my  ship  comes  in,  she  must 
first  go  out.  My  ship  was  the  stanch 
schooner  "  Ida  Izette"  (or,  as  we  said,  hit,  accent 
ing  the  first  syllabic),  and  she  was  built  in 
Waterside  and  launched  beside  the  little  wharf 
of  that  hamlet. 

Waterside  was  a  delicious  little  nook  of  virgin 
rusticity,  sweet  with  the  breath  of  clover  mead 
ows,  and  salt  with  the  wholesome  savor  of  the 
bay.  Nestled  on  a  gently  sloping  shore,  it  was 
sheltered  by  its  curving,  sickle-shaped  beach, 
and  it  looked  meekly  up  to  the  faint  outline  of 
Mount  Faith,  blue  as  a  cloud  in  the  distance. 
Its  narrow,  turfy  "  laneways,"  its  moist  fields, 
where  fringed  gentian  may  be  abundantly  gath 
ered,  or  its  sandy  "  driftways "  made  for  the 
uses  of  the  "  seaweed  privilege,"  are  still  quieter 
now  than  they  were  twenty-five  years  ago,  when 
a  boat-building  industry  peopled  the  village 
with  captains  and  carpenters.  These  classes 
were  the  owners  of  the  thrifty  little  shops,  savory 
with  fresh  odors  of  newly  planed  pine,  and 
luxurious  with  piles  of  long,  rustling  shavings, 
covering  the  floor  ankle-deep ;  and  of  the  trim 


"  WHEN   MY  SHIP   COMES   IN."  2$ 

cottages  embellished  with  rustic  work,  and 
graced  with  tokens  of  pains-taking  taste  and 
sea-faring  bounty,  in  the  sweet-brier  by  the 
window,  or  the  pink-lined  shells  in  the  porch. 
To-day  one  of  these  dwellings,  made  fine  with 
bay-windows  and  piazzas  that  are  dotted  with 
hammocks  and  camp-chairs,  and  provided 
with  a  carefully  mounted  telescope,  is  but  the 
summer  tenant's  ornate  reproduction  of  the 
native's  snug  habitation ;  which  showed  only 
such  unstudied  signs  of  local  color  as  the  spy 
glass  kept  on  the  hooks  of  the  cleat  in  the 
kitchen,  or  a  half-hemmed  sail  thrown  on  the 
rag  carpet  of  the  "  front-room,"  and  awaiting 
the  afternoon  leisure  of  the  daughter  of  the 
house,  • —  "  Cap'n  Bill's  'Liza,"  or  "  Cap'n  'Lijah's 
Emmeline;  "  for  in  this  compact,  homogeneous, 
and  kindred  community,  to  designate  house 
holders  and  their  families  by  their  surnames 
would  have  been  to  use  a  superfluity  of  sound. 

The  launching  of  the  "  Ida  Izette  "  was  a  long- 
anticipated  event  that  brought  together  with 
one  accord  the  dwellers  in  Waterside  and  its 
neighborhood,  as  well  as  certain  representatives 
of  that  gypsy  class  not  then  known  to  us  under 
the  curt  term  of  "  tramps,"  but  more  feelingly 
described  by  the  half-patriarchal  appellation  of 
"  old  travellers." 

Among  those  witnesses  of  the  ceremony  who 
might  be  called  its  patrons  was .  an  amiable  old 


26  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

gentleman,  the  latest  descendant  of  a  family 
once  numbered  in  the  Xarragansett  squirarchy, 
but  which  had  wasted  its  possessions  with  the 
facility  of  the  improvident  Irish  gentry.  This 
bachelor  squireen,  then,  who  bore  the  hereditary 
name  of  Silvanus,  was  a  gentleman  of  small 
estate,  but  large  leisure.  Reputed  "  not  so  wise 
as  some  folks  be,"  his  education,  both  early  and 
late,  had  been  of  a  desultory  character.  But  he 
was  an  untiring  reader,  fond  of  historical  dis 
quisitions,  especially  attracted  by  the  fortunes 
of  the  Ptolemies,  and  imperilling  the  gravity  of 
his  listeners  by  invariably  styling  them  the 
"Pottleomies."  An  instance  of  the  inevitable 
devotion  of  the  gentle  Squire  Silvanus  to  any 
utterly  unpractical  interest,  and  the  fine  indiffer 
ence  with  which  he  met  any  worldly  crisis,  was 
related  by  neighbors  who  dwelt  upon  the  palmy 
days  of  the  Squire's  middle  life,  and  the  afflu 
ence  with  which  he  was  no  longer  burdened. 
Narragansett  was  still  famous  for  its  dairy 
products  in  those  days,  and  a  packet-sloop 
lying  at  the  Northeast  Ferry  was  to  be  loaded 
with  cheeses  from  the  Cape  Farm,  with  other 
shipments  of  the  country  trade.  The  wind  was 
fair  for  departure,  but  this  particular  share  of 
the  freight  was  delayed,  until  the  Captain  him 
self,  impatient  to  weigh  anchor,  went  to  inquire 
of  the  tardy  Squire.  Nobody  at  the  farm  could 
tell  where  the  master  of  the  house  was  to  be 


"  WHEN   MY   SHIP   COMES   IN."  27 

found,  but  the  Captain,  muttering  wrath,  strode 
heavily  on  through  the  wide,  bare  rooms  of  the 
old  house  until  at  last  the  rickety  garret-stairs 
groaned  beneath  his  masterful  tread;  and  there, 
in  a  dusty,  cobwebby  corner,  was  the  spare,  bent 
figure  of  the  Squire,  crouched  in  the  character 
istic  attitude  which  had  gained  him  the  sobri 
quet  of  "  Scrunch-up,"  and  eagerly  peering 
through  the  pebble  glasses  of  his  heavy  silver- 
bowed  spectacles  at  the  yellow  pages  spread 
before  him.  Happily  oblivious  of  all  homely 
cares,  Silvanus  was  busy  with  the  congenial 
labor  of  polishing  his  pedigree.  Strewn  around 
him  were  letters  and  family  papers,  and  piled 
beside  him  were  the  old  volumes  of  divinity 
reserved  for  his  recreation  in  reading  when  his 
antiquarian  toils  should  be  suspended.  "  Bless 
my  soul,  Zach  !  I  forgot  all  about  it !  "  was  the 
only  explanation  that  could  be  drawn  from  the 
innocent  student  by  the  irate  man  of  affairs ;  and 
after  indulging  in  some  of  the  polite  language 
cultivated  by  men  of  his -calling  —  perhaps  no 
strange  sound  to  those  walls  "  if  ancient  tales 
speak  true,"  nor  wrong  the  reputation  of  their 
founder,  known  as  "  Wicked  Will  "  —  the  Cap 
tain  turned  his  back  upon  the  meek  descendant 
of  that  fiery  ancestor,  and  left  the  Squire  to 
solace  himself  with  further  researches  in  the 
buried  treasures  of  the  garret. 

The  greatest  contrast  to  the  kindly  -Squire  in 


28  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

all  the  company  was  old  Grinman,  the  capitalist 
of  the  place,  as  much  envied  as  the  ricJiard  of  a 
French  village,  and  known  as  the  hardest  man 
and  the  worst  neighbor  in  the  district.  Misan 
thrope  and  miser,  his  presence  at  the  little 
gathering  was  but  a  matter  of  accident,  and  was 
no  sign  of  sympathy  with  the  interests  of  his 
neighbors.  He  was  almost  a  sorcerer  in  the 
village  opinion,  in  virtue  of  his  reputed  wealth 
in  bank  stock,  and  his  recondite  attainments  in 
ciphering,  —  anecdotes  of  his  profound  skill 
in  figures  being  in  part  the  foundation  for  the 
awe  in  which  he  was  held.  He  had  a  long 
head,  as  was  commonly  said  of  him,  and,  yes, 
he  had  good  headpiece,  the  villagers  assented, 
but  he  was  a  nigh-dweller,  and  no  neighbor,  as 
poor  Widow  Broomer  declared,  when  he  lamed 
her  cow  by  stoning  the  creature  out  of  his 
pasture.  Age  had  not  humanized  him,  or  made 
him  tolerant  of  his  kind,  and  as  he  stood  apart 
from  the  crowd  surveying  its  bustle  with  a  sneer, 
his  cold  and  cruel  eyes  dealt  stabs  of  quite 
another  character  than  those  described  by 
Mercutio. 

The  well-to-do  farmer  of  the  community,  and 
one  of  the  principal  shareholders  in  the  "  Ida 
Izette "  was  Sam  D.,  who  was  always  thus  de 
signated  to  distinguish  him  from  the  three  or 
four  relatives  who  bore  the  same  name  and 
patronymic.  The  initial  stood  for  nothing,  hav- 


"  WHEN   MY   SHIP   COMES   IN."  29 

ing  been  adopted  when  his  business  life  began 
simply  as  a  trade-mark  by  which  the  owner 
might  be  known.  Sam  D.  was  a  shrewd, 
thrifty,  bustling  son  of  gain.  He  might  be 
described  as  the  realization  of  Yankee  sharp 
ness,  mitigated  by  vanity.  This  always  ami 
able  trait  modified  the  rigorous  outlines  of  a 
nature  hardened  by  early  contact  with  toil  and 
privation.  He  was  the  great  man  at  all  the 
funerals  of  the  district,  and  would  cheerfully 
lose  half  a  day's  work  for  the  pleasure  of  bury 
ing  an  old  neighbor.  He  pinched  and  saved, 
scraped  and  delved,  lived  on  pork  and  porridge, 
with  his  hired  men,  and  was,  as  they  said,  "  clost 
as  the  bark  to  a  tree ;  "  then,  with  a  delightfully 
childish  prodigality,  he  adorned  his  wife  with  a 
gold  watch,  apparently  for  the  sake  of  the  satis 
faction  it  afforded  him,  at  the  next  funeral,  to 
walk  complacently  through  a  room  conspicu 
ously  furnished  with  a  loud-ticking  eight-day 
clock,  in  order  to  inquire  in  the  general  hear 
ing,  "Ma,  what  -time  is  it  by  your  watch?" 
With  such  occasional  lapses  into  inconsequent 
expenditure  and  funereal  geniality,  he  was  but 
a  neophyte  in  that  stern  worship  of  gain  and 
scorn  of  humanity  of  which  Old  Grinman  was 
so  eminent  an  example ;  and  the  Yankee  Timon 
regarded  the  busy,  self-important,  garrulous 
farmer  with  a  sovereign  contempt. 

Among  the   pleasing   instances   of  harmless 


3O  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

vanity  in  the  rustic  assembly  was  a  queer,  thin, 
piping,  little  old  man,  still  wuaring  "  the  old- 
world  corduroys,"  and  dwelling  long  upon  the 
advantageous  advice,  matured  by  long  experi 
ence,  he  had  given  to  the  builders  of  the  "  Ida 
Izctte."  But  he  was  never  doubtful  of  his  pow 
ers  in  any  cause.  It  was  a  favorite  hypothesis 
of  his  that  if  he  could  only  have  talked  with 
"  old  King  Gearge,"  the  Revolution  need  never 
have  occurred.  His  townsmen  were  disposed 
to  find  his  local  flights  of  fancy  still  more  am 
bitious,  as  when  he  would  wistfully  ask,  in  his 
slow  utterance :  "  Now,  neighbor,  what  d'  ye 
think  makes  Squire  Potter  and  Squire  Hazard 
always  talk  to  me  wheresumever  they  see  me?  " 
"  Why,  I  don't  know,  Uncle  Simon."  "  Well, 
neighbor,  I  '11  tell  ye.  'T  is  to  draar  knalidge  — 
yes,  to  draar  knalidge."  Simon  was  the  hap 
piest  of  men,  and  even  dwelt  mildly  on  his  one 
grievance,  the  acquisition  of  an  undesirable  son- 
in-law,  who  was  "  a  furriner  from  York,"  and 
was  otherwise  objectionable  in  South-County 
eyes. 

Of  course  the  chief  mechanics  of  Waterside, 
and  the  builders  of  the  schooner,  Old  Job  and 
Young  Job,  were  both  present.  Old  Job  was 
an  immature  patriarch  of  two  score  and  ten,  who 
held  his  brevet  title  of  antiquity  in  right  of  a 
dazed,  meek,  Rip  Van  Winkle  air,  and  because 
of  the  rapid  and  weedy  growth  of  Young  Job, 


"WHEN   MY   SHIP   COMES   IN."  31 

who  had  never  overcome  the  shyness  to  which 
he  fell  an  early  prey  in  the  uneasy  conscious 
ness  that  his  wits  had  hardly  kept  pace  with  his 
stature.  He  was  a  most  dutiful  repetition  of 
his  parent.  Old  Job  was  moderate,  and  Young 
Job  was  irresolute;  Old  Job  was  plaintive,  and 
Young  Job  was  querulous.  Of  griefs  he  had 
an  unfailing  store,  and  he  was  darkly  pessi 
mistic  in  his  anticipations,  especially  as  to  the 
mercantile  fortunes  of  the  "  Ida  Izette."  He 
weakly  deplored  the  unwelcome  presence  of 
old  Grinman.  Poor  Young  Job  had  never  re 
covered  from  the  shock  which  he  received  in 
the  sneer  with  which  old  Grinman  once  marked 
his  appearance  on  a  Sunday  in  his  best  suit, 
and  accompanied  by  his  wife  and  baby.  Old 
Grinman  was  no  patron  of  the  domestic  virtues, 
having  long  since  driven  his  wretched  family 
into  deserting  the  crazy  shelter  of  his  roof  for 
the  charities  of  the  world.  The  excessively 
frail  and  feeble  character  of  Young  Job's  con 
stitution  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  this 
casting  the  evil  eye  upon  him  by  Grinman  so 
overcame  him  that  for  the  remainder  of  the 
day  he  was  obliged  to  rest  on  a  rather  unluxuri- 
ous  lounge  of  his  own  making.  Young  Job's 
spouse  .was  unfortunately  another  drooping 
spirit,  who  did  not  seem  to  enjoy  poor  health, 
though  she  said  she  did.  She  did  not  stand 
high  among  her  neighbors  as  an  energetic 


32  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS.    - 

housewife.  Indeed,  Sally,  our  ancient  help,  used 
to  say  that  "  nothing  ailded  Young  Job  but  liv 
ing  on  them  dreadful  stodges  that  Ann  Frances 
made."  (A  stodge  in  cookery  is  equivalent  to 
a  bodge  in  handicraft.)  It  was,  then,  a  feeble 
hand  that  the  youthful  but  infirm  Job  lent  to  the 
work  of  launching. 

Of  course,  the  sad-faced  womankind  of  the 
village,  dwelling  in  that  shadow  which  seems 
to  brood  perpetually  over  rustic  matronhood, 
lent  their  melancholy  presence  to  the  occa 
sion.  There  were  the  Alzadys  and  the  Celindys, 
with  plain  Sarahs  and  Susans,  and  an  irrepres 
sible  mob  of  children,  concerning  whom  their 
plaintive  mothers  dejectedly  exchanged  con 
fidences;  or  held  a  conclave  of  agitated  sun- 
bonnets  over  the  gossip  suggested  by  the  ap 
pearance  of  the  usual  pair  of  rustic  lovers,  never 
absent  from  public  gatherings,  who  walked  hand 
in  hand  with  an  Arcadian  simplicity  that  was 
quite  undisturbed  by  the  vociferous  shouting 
of  their  customary  heralds,  the  group  of  de 
risive  younger  brothers  and  sisters  who  thus 
proclaimed  them :  — 

"  Ethan  Streeter,  see  him  ride, 
Sword  and  pistol  by  his  side, 
And  Hepsey  Harvey  to  be  his  bride." 

But  nobody  was  annoyed  by  noise  and  con 
fusion  on  this  day  of  festivity,  not  even  the 


"  WHEN  MY   SHIP   COMES   IN."  33 

rather  finical  Clacksum  girls,  as  the  spinster  sis 
ters  of  that  name  had  been  known  to  Waterside 
for  the  last  half-century.  They  had  attained 
their  three  score  and  ten,  and  it  seemed  as  if 
their  late-lingering  girlhood  might  in  time  give 
place  to  the  estate  of  womanhood,  with  its  titles 
and  dignities. 

No  Waterside  assembly  was  ever  complete 
without  the  presence  of  the  Elder,  who  was  just 
at  this  time  making  one  of  his  semi-annual  visits 
to  the  hamlet.  He  was,  as  he  often  solemnly 
declared,  "  a  wanderer  upon  the  face  of  the 
airth,"  but  he  was  not  averse  to  a  prolonged 
stay  in  comfortable  quarters.  He  had  scarcely 
reached  middle  life  when,  with  a  fine  confidence 
in  his  species,  he  frankly  threw  himself  upon  the 
hospitalities  of  the  countryside.  His  welcome, 
if  not  exactly  enthusiastic,  had  been  lasting, 
since  he  had  journeyed  from  house  to  house  in 
Narragansett  for  a  generation.  He  came  and 
went  with  the  seasons;  and  his  visits  were  as 
regular  and  inevitable  as  the  intrusions  of  the 
professional  tax-gatherer.  The  Elder's  ministra 
tions  had  been  ungraciously  declined  by  his  sect, 
but  he  had  now  been  for  years,  in  virtue  of  his 
course  of  life,  no  inconsiderable  preacher.  His 
presence  was  in  itself  a  sermon  that  enforced  the 
duties  of  hospitality,  and  the  graces  of  patience 
and  toleration.  It  was  worth  while  to  help 
toward  sustaining  such  a  touching  example  of 
3 


34  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

trust  in  human  indulgence,  and  such  a  convincing 
instance  of  the  occasional  appearance  in  our  hard 
New  England  character  of  the  simple  traits  of 
the  idle  children  of  the  South.  Thus  the  Elder 
might  be  said  to  be  cultivated  like  some  noble 
exotic;  and  there  was  a  genuinely  tropical  lux 
uriance  and  amplitude  in  his  figure  and  bearing, 
and  in  his  florid  vocabulary.  On  this  occasion 
he  had  exchanged  a  modest  greeting  with  the 
Squire,  and  sat  not  far  from  him,  lost  in  drowsy 
meditations. 

The  boys  of  Waterside  found  the  impressive 
presence  of  Gamby  a  stimulus  to  their  faculties 
of  observation,  arid  he  was  the  animated  centre 
of  a  gaping  crowd.  Gamby  was  a  stalwart  negro, 
a  ward  of  the  town-farm,  and  the  massive  iron 
ball  and  chain  which  he  dragged  after  him,  and- 
which  was  fastened  to  an  iron  band  around  his 
ankle,  was  proof  of  the  futility  of  the  efforts  of 
his  guardians  to  control  his  taste  for  roving. 
With  the  brute  strength  of  an  idiot  Samson, 
and  the  instinctive  cunning  which  lurked  in  his 
admixture  of  Indian  blood,  he  repeatedly  made 
his  escape  and  roamed  the  country  until  he  was 
ready  to  return;  for,  though  the  common  opin 
ion  was  that  Gamby  did  not  know  his  strength,  it 
was  noticeable  that  no  one  cared  to  test  the  truth 
of  this  convenient  theory.  What  with  his  shreds 
and  tatters,  his  half-running  gait,  and  the  sight  of 
his  head  rolling  heavily  from  side  to  side,  his 


SWE  mpiui  sow 


«  WHEN   MY   SHIP   COMES   IN. 

great  animal  tongue  lolling  out,  and  his  glistening 
wolfish  teeth  all  agrin,  Gamby,  in  his  useless  fet 
ters,  was  a  spectacle  that  might  have  appalled  a 
less  easy-going  community  than  Waterside.  But 
the  villagers  regarded  him  stolidly  enough,  and 
to  the  children  he  was  a  highly  acceptable  real 
ization  of  their  ideal  of  a  giant. 

Another  estray  from  the  town-farm  was  Liz,  a 
wretched  old  woman  of  shattered  wits,  who 
quartered  herself  upon  her  relatives  in  Water 
side  as  often  as  she  could  evade  the  not  very 
vigilant  watch  of  her  official  protectors.  After 
her  tramp  she  would  reach  the  village  wrought 
up  to  the  frenzy  of  a  Bacchante  by  her  desperate 
encounters  with  imaginary  pursuers,  and  espe 
cially  by  the  long  abstinence  from  the  healing 
leaves  of  that  herb  which  she  now  begged  of  the 
crowd  under  the  cry  of  "  Backer  !  Backer !  "  It 
was  told  of  this  dehumanized  object  that  she  had 
been  the  handsomest  girl  of  her  time,  and  that  a 
time  incredibly  recent,  in  view  of  the  wild  and 
haggard  features  that  seemed  never  to  have 
known  youth. 

Lettice  Jetsam,  a  more  commonplace  vagrant, 
with  no  background  of  early  romance  to  re 
lieve  her  present  uncomeliness,  was  searching 
the  swamp  on  the  Waterside  shore  always  known 
as  the  "  Indian  Garden,"  whither,  as  traditionary 
story  relates,  Miantonomi  resorted  for  the  potent 
herbs  used  in  his  wigwam,  pitched  a  few  miles 


36  SOUTH-COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

inland,  at  "  Miantonomi's  Rock."  With  the  aid 
of  her  boon  companion,  a  Charlestown  squaw, 
laden  with  baskets,  her  handiwork  and  stock  in 
trade,  Lettice  pursued  her  hunt  after  simples, 
now  and  then  addressing  some  shrill  but  un 
heeded  admonition  to  her  nameless  imbecile 
daughter,  a  gaunt  and  staring  child  of  want, 
whom  Lettice  had  as  yet  failed  to  dispose  of  at 
any  of  the  houses  where,  after  receiving  charity, 
she  usually  attempted  to  bestow  her  in  adoption, 
as  a  parting  gift.  This  poor  dwarfish  creature, 
huddled  in  her  amorphous  rags  on  a  mossy 
tussock,  looked  like  some  glowering  gnome  just 
risen  out  of  the  earth.  With  her  back  to  the 
scene  of  the  launching,  which  had  no  interest  for 
her,  she  stealthily  repeated,  with  a  gloating  sat 
isfaction,  a  series  of  signs  and  motions  indicat 
ing  the  slaughter  in  a  farm-yard  to  which  she 
had  once  been  admitted  when  the  sanguinary 
artist  in  such  work  arrived,  in  order,  as  he  ambi 
tiously  said,  to  butcher  the  turkeys.  This  had 
been  the  only  scene  of  object-teaching  that  had 
ever  touched  a  responsive  chord  in  her  gentle 
breast. 

The  decisive  moment  of  the  launching  came 
as  a  surprise  at  last;  and  the  universal  thrill  that 
responded  to  the  lovely  sight  of  the  gliding, 
white-winged  thing  of  life,  cleaving  the  sunny 
waters  that  met  her  with  a  manifold  welcome, 
found  expression  in  — 


"  WHEN  MY  SHIP  COMES   IN."  37 

"The  shout,  prolonged  and  loud, 
That  rose  from  the  assembled  crowd." 

The  Squireen,  standing  on  a  little  knoll, 
waved  his  hand  in  benevolent  patronage.  Old 
Grinman,  the  only  unmoved  witness  of  the  emo 
tion  that  pulsed  around  him,  contorted  his  sar 
donic  features  in  "  a  contemchous  sneer,"  of 
which  Young  Job  feebly  complained.  Ann 
Frances,  Job's  wife,  who  enjoyed  a  social  dis 
tinction  that  was  chiefly  based  upon  the  recon 
dite  character  of  the  ailments  that  she  cultivated, 
was  heard  plaintively  announcing  that  she  must 
go  home  right  away,  for  she  "  had  hild  in  her 
breath  so  long,  waiting  'round  there,  that  she 
was  all  nerved  up,  and  she  believed  one  of  them 
distressed  spells  was  coming  on."  The  cheering 
was  prolonged  by  Calvin  Luther,  the  heir  of  the 
house  of  Old  and  Young  Job,  who,  whirling  the 
shattered  straw  hat  that  imperfectly  thatched  his 
wildly  straying  locks,  uttered  a  shout  in  which 
he  was  ably  seconded  by  his  shrill-lunged  sister, 
Hannah  Ann,  who  had  deserted  her  patchwork 
task  and  the  company  of  her  rag-doll,  having, 
in  the  words  of  her  melancholy  mother,  "  set  up 
a  tease  to  come."  The  barking  of  the  village 
mongrels  echoed  this  final  hurrah  and  announced 
the  arrival  of  Joe  Timmel,  the  singing  stroller 
"of  the  Narragansett  shore,  and  the  itinerant 
missionary  of  Calvinism.  As  the  familiar  figure 
of  the  South-County  Joe  o'  Bedlam  advanced, 


38  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

with  his  rolling  gait,  and  his  customary  innocent 
leer,  the  refrain  of  his  favorite  medley  was 
heard,  "  When  the  wicked  am  all  burnt  up  — 
ah !  "  and  to  the  music  of  this  benediction  the 
"  Ida  Izette  "  sailed  down  the  bay.  Its  parting 
echoes  were  still  sounding  as  the  little  company 
rapidly  dispersed.  The  short  period  of  cohesion 
in  the  village  community  was  over,  and  its  atoms 
were  instantly  scattered,  each  to  its  own  place ; 
sympathy  and  interest  had  had  their  hour,  and 
idiosyncrasies  resumed  their  rule.  Only  a  small 
group  of  shareholders  and  seafarers  remained  to 
discuss  the  prospects  of  the  schooner.  Her 
voyage  was  thus  auspiciously  begun  in  the  pre 
lude  of  her  successful  launching. 

"  Yon  bright  bark  goes 
Where  traffic  blows, 
From  lands  of  sun  to  lands  of  snows. 
This  happier  one, 
Its  course  is  run, 
From  lands  of  snows  to  lands  of  sun." 

Such  was  the  fortune  of  the  "  Ida  I^zette ;  "  and 
after  a  successful  voyage,  she  made  a  pros 
perous  run  homeward,  laden  with  a  rich  and 
picturesque  cargo.  Her  arrival  was  the  signal 
for  a  flocking  of  Waterside  characters  to  the 
wharf  to  share  in  the  spoil.  For  days  together 
the  hamlet  wore  an  air  of  abandon  and  revelry, 
while  the  welcome  task  of  unlading  went  cheer 
fully  on.  Many  a  burst  of  rustic  wit  was  hailed 


"WHEN   MY   SHIP   COMES   IN."  39 

with  the  ready  laughter  of  open-air  workers ; 
and  the  riotous  influences  of  the  scene  pene 
trated  even  to  the  domestic  interiors  where  the 
children,  feasting  on  the  moist  brown  Mexican 
sugar,  had  arrived  at  a  state  of  ecstatic  bliss, 
and  a  quality  of  personal  appearance  to  which 
no  expressions  could  do  justice  save  the  rugged 
vernacular  of  their  grandames,  who  announced 
that  it  was  "  mux  and  gawm,  gawm  and  mux, 
with  them  childern,  and  wuss  than  a  Sabbath 
school  picnic  all  -the  time."  Waterside  exulted 
in  the  luxuriance  of  its  tropical  wealth.  The 
fragrance  of  the  orange  and  the  banana  floated 
on  every  breeze,  while  coffee  and  spices  soothed 
the  soul  of  the  housewife,  and  age  was  pla 
cated  by  the  gift  of  a  Tonka  bean  to  enrich  the 
last  supply  of  rappee.  The  village  had  indeed 

"  Suffered  a  sea-change, 
Into  something  rich  and  strange." 

Bright  stuffs  fluttered  from  the  shoulders  of  its 
damsels,  gay  bunting  draped  its  porches,  and  a 
new  and  splendid  fauna  had  suddenly  appeared, 
as  though  the  schooner  had  been  a  complete 
Noah's  ark.  Paroquets  fed  tamely  with  pigeons, 
and  great  macaws  sunned  their  gaudy  barbaric 
plumage,  looking  like  Indians  .in  war  paint. 
Dearest  to  the  heart  of  boyhood  was  the  caged 
"  wildcat "  still  held  in  quarantine.  He  was  a 
small,  fierce,  black,  restless  creature,  not  easily 


40  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

classified  by  means  of  the  most  diligent  study  of 
the  press  and  plates  of  "  Goldsmith's  Animated 
Nature,"  but  ravenous  to  a  charm,  and  devour 
ing  red,  raw  morsels  with  the  insatiate  appetite 
of  a  Ugolino. 

Time  would  fail  me  to  tell  of  all  the  wonders 
of  sea  and  shore  which  gladdened  the  eyes  of 
Waterside  dwellers,  at  the  advent  of  the  good 
schooner  "  Ida  Izette."  But  memory  has  laid  up 
in  store  the  fragrant  associations  of  a  time  when 
our  little  strip  of  New  England  coast  basked  in 
the  borrowed  atmosphere  of  the  tropics.  We 
children  all  went  to  the  most  delightful  of 
schools  in  making  acquaintance  with  the  deck 
and  the  hold  of  the  "Ida  Izette;"  and  such 
were  the  treasures  we  found  in  those  charmed 
regions,  so  rich  are  the  recollections  of  this 
choice  episode  in  our  child-life,  that  not  one 
of  us  all  can  be  so  ungrateful  to  our  kindly  fates 
as  to  deny  that  once,  at  least,  to  each  of  us,  our 
ship  came  in  from  sea. 


AT  A  SHEEP-WASHING. 

THE  wayfarer  in  the  South  County  of  nearly 
forty  years  ago  might  find  himself,  like 
Dante  at  the  beginning  of  his  pilgrimage,  be 
fore  the  entrance  to  a  dense  wood.  With  its 
goodly  oaks  of  a  century's  growth  it  looked  a 
forest  primeval.  But  it  was,  according  to  the 
tradition  of  the  countryside,  the  plantation  of  a 
choleric  old  squire,  who,  in  his  resentment  at 
finding  himself  cheated  in  a  bargain  for  cord- 
wood  made  with  a  shrewd  neighbor,  swore 
roundly  that  no  heir  of  his  estate  should  ever 
suffer  a  like  annoyance ;  and  immediately 
planted  the  sandy  plain  sloping  to  the  river 
that  bounded  his  patrimonial  acres  with  oaks 
and  maples,  and  had  them  cultivated  by  his 
negro  servants,  until  they  had  well  begun  that 
growth  which  now  in  its  maturity  overhung 
with  shade  the  smoothly  sloping  banks  of  the 
stream  of  the  full-syllabled  Indian  name,  the 
accepted  meaning  of  which  was  in  keeping  with 
the  practical  tendencies  of  the  aboriginal  mind, 
for  it  signified  "  plenty  of  fish."  Thus  by  the 
kindly  offices  of  Nature  the  wrath  of  man  was 


42  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

turned  to  praise;  and  the  plantation  which 
perhaps  originated  in  caprice  or  anger,  but 
was  doubtless  continued  from  worthier  mo 
tives,  kept  green  the  memory  of  the  bluff  old 
squire. 

Following  the  cart-path  which  led  through 
the  wood  to  the  water,  the  pilgrim  was  from 
time  to  time  met  by  creatures  as  strange  and 
nondescript  as  any  that  were  encountered  by 
the  observant  Gulliver  in  his  adventurous  trav 
els.  Long-legged  and  awkward,  with  sodden 
elf-locks,  shrunken  features,  abject  and  cowering 
air,  and  frightened  cry,  the  silly  sheep  —  as  the 
poetry  of  old  English  rustic  life,  with  Homeric 
persistency  of  epithet,  constantly  styles  them  — 
rushed  by,  shivering  from  their  involuntary 
plunge  in  the  cool  waters  of  Rocky  River. 

The  principal  sheep-washer,  who  was  sud 
denly  discovered  as  a  turn  in  the  path  brought 
the  scene  of  the  day's  labors  into  view,  proved 
to  be  a  shepherd  of  souls  as  well  as  of  sheep. 
He  was  no  other  than  the  powerful  exhorter, 
Elder  Bissell,  or  "  Bizzle,"  as  his  name  was  cur 
rently  known.  Tall  and  muscular,  though  bony, 
stooping,  and  ungainly,  his  lank  black  hair,  high 
cheek  bones,  inky  eyes,  and  swart  complexion, 
presented  a  suggestion  of  that  reversion  to  the 
aboriginal  type  which  is  so  anxiously  sought 
by  fanciful  ethnologists.  The  Elder  was  a  daily 
laborer  on  the  farm,  as  well  as  in  the  spiritual 


AT  A   SHEEP-WASHING.  43 

vineyard,  and  might  well  sing  with  particular 
fervor  of 

"  Flocks  that  whiten  all  the  fields 
All  the  stores  the  garding  yields." 

Just  now,  as  he  took  the  mute  but  struggling 
sheep  brought  from  the  pen  by  the  waterside 
in  the  firm  grasp  of  Benjy,  the  sinewy  youth 
who  waded  out  to  him  as  he  stood  in  the 
stream  ready  to  plunge  his  panting  prey  un 
der  the  current,  his  action  inevitably  suggested 
those  kindred  offices  which  he  often  rendered  in 
the  same  surroundings  to  his  human  flock  who 
sought  in  Rocky  River  the  blessings  of  Jordan. 
The  Elder's  ministrations  were  naturally  charged 
with  the  ghostly  influences  of  his  native  region. 
The  Dark  Plains,  as  they  were  strangely  called, 
perhaps  from  their  lack  of  spiritual  enlighten 
ment,  had  from  ancient  times  been  the  walking- 
ground  of  "  harnts,"  the  centre  of  witchcraft 
wonders,  and  even  the  scene  of  meetings  with 
mysterious  beasts  and  talking  birds,  whose  in 
telligence,  as  described  by  the  belated  traveller 
who  had  heard  and  seen  them  on  his  tardy 
return  from  the  husking  frolic,  suggested  the 
keenness  of  their  prototypes  of  an  "  Arabian 
Nights' "  story.  One  of  these  raconteurs  used 
to  relate  the  story  of  his  tarry  at  an  apple-bee, 
at  which y  the  vintage  of  the  last  year's  cider- 
press  had  flowed  a  little  too  freely,  and  of  his 


44  SOUTH-COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

homeward  return  by  a  path  which  crooked  and 
turned  unaccountably,  but  in  which  he  con 
stantly  met,  when  crossing  the  Plains,  a  very 
knowing  little  bird,  who  hopped  by  his  side 
with  the  persistent  reproach,  "  Oh,  Tom,  Tom, 
how  could  you,  Tom  !  " 

These  tales  of  the  Plains  often  found  a  nar 
rator  in  the  sheep-washer  who  was  the  Elder's 
co-laborer,  and  who  on  more  favorable  occa 
sions  than  the  present  would  impart  this  ghostly 
lore  to  the  circle  that  met  at  the  same  spot 
on  Rocky  River  for  the  winter  pursuits  of  the 
eel  or  smelt-fishing.  The  struggle  with  the 
affrighted  subjects  of  his  treatment  now  re 
quired  all  his  attention,  and  drew  rather 
heavily  upon  his  patience ;  for  his  proper  call 
ing  was  that  of  a  shearer,  and  he  was  serving 
in  a  humbler  capacity  merely  to  oblige  his 
friend  the  Elder.  His  great  display  of  skill 
would  be  made  on  his  return,  a  week  later,  to 
shear  the  sheep  that  were  now  turned  loose 
as  fast  as  they  were  washed.  Each  helpless 
creature,  seized  in  a  tenacious  grasp,  would 
be  speedily  routed,  as  it  were,  from  its  fleecy 
shelter.  The  unrelenting  shears  would  run  with 
practised  skill  under  the  woolly  locks,  severing 
the  clinging  mass,  which  the  deft  touch  of  the 
worker  rapidly  rolled  up  into  the  fleece  of 
commerce,  as  easefully  as  the  mower  sweeps 
down  the  swaths  when  the  grass  is  wet  with 


AT  A   SHEEP-WASHING.  45 

falling  rain.  Thus  denuded  of  its  coat,  the 
animal  stands  forth  in  all  the  rugged  harsh 
ness  of  its  bare  framework,  and  is  discovered 
to  be  but  a  scaffolding  for  sustaining  a  load 
of  wool.  These  living  results  of  the  shearer's 
handiwork  vie  in  precision  of  ugliness  with  the 
grotesque  achievements  of  the  artisan  in  wood- 
carving. 

Nor  were  admiring  witnesses  wanting  to  the 
skill  of  those  masters  of  muscle,  Elder  Bizzle 
and  Uncle  Shearman.  Besides  Benjy,  the  abler 
of  the  two  attendant  youths  whose  presence  was 
indispensable  to  the  success  of  the  work,  there 
was  the  usual  knot  of  idlers  without  whose 
countenance  no  special  episode  of  rustic  labor 
is  ever  completed.  They  are  always  ready  to 
assist  by  their  attendance,  and  will  kindly  give 
character  to  any  of  the  undertakings  of  their 
neighbors,  however  remotely  they  might  be 
supposed  to  be  interested  in  them.  So,  like  a 
Greek  chorus,  which  laments,  but  never  rescues, 
the  spectators  loudly  ejaculated  "  Whew !  "  or 
"  Jericho ! "  at  sundry  crises  in  the  washing, 
as  when  Benjy,  the  chief  acolyte  of  the  cere 
mony,  missed  his  footing  on  the  pebbly  bank, 
and  nearly  lost  his  fleecy  burden ;  but  gave  no 
sign  of  leaving  their  more  or  less  easy  perches 
on  the  stone-wall  bounding  the  wood-lot,  to 
come  to  his  help. 

But  now  the  noon-spell  arrived,  with  its  tacit 


46  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

summons  to  the  mid-day  meal,  and  the  attend 
ant  chorus  gave  tokens  of  a  lively  sympathy 
with  that  phase  of  the  day's  proceedings.  The 
laborers  sought  each  for  his  own  ample  portion, 
brought  that  morning  from  home,  and  fell  to 
with  a  will  upon  such  cold  viands  as  boiled 
pork  and  greens,  johnny-cake  and  pickles, 
"  white  bread,"  pie,  and  gingerbread.  These 
combinations  were  discussed  with  a  vigor  too 
often  wanting  in  these  degenerate  days,  in 
which  even  the  Old  Farmer's  Almanac  of  this 
current  year  recognizes  the  existence  of  nervous 
prostration. 

Among  the  "raft"  of  loungers,  as  the  Elder, 
with  pardonable  surliness,  styled  them,  and  who 
now  joined  the  group  at  dinner,  was  that  always 
entertaining  itinerant,  "  Doctor "  Billy  Hood, 
who  was  not  slow  to  claim  the  brotherhood  of 
man,  and  especially  of  doctors,  but  recognized 
no  other  remedy  than  his  own  specific,  the 
"  Compound  Tar- Water,"  the  virtues  of  which 
he  extolled  in  the  pauses  of  the  meal.  Another 
aged  stroller  and  vender  of  simples,  was  the 
supposed  possessor  of  certain  occult  powers  of 
healing,  drawn  from  an  hereditary  source.  The 
local  records  were  reticent  as  to  the  origin  of 
Camper  Boose  ;  but  local  gossip  derived  it  from 
a  not  very  remote  Indian  descent,  a  belief  which 
naturally  gave  great  currency  to  his  herbal  re 
cipes.  This  "relic  of  barbarism"  was  seated 


AT  A   SHEEP-WASHING.  47 

by  another  survivor  of  his  generation,  "  Major  " 
by  name.  If  he  had  ever  borne  any  other,  he 
had  lost  it  somewhere  in  the  course  of  his 
Wandering  Jew  existence ;  but  he  was  said  to 
have  earned  his  present  sobriquet  by  having 
"old-sogered  it"  —  that  is,  shirked  and  scamped 
his  work  —  on  the  few  occasions  when  he  had 
been  numbered  among  the  "work-folks"  of  a 
farm.  Spoken  of  as  being  "  a  little  off,  you 
know,"  he  excited  no  surprise  by  his  minute 
and  fluent  accounts  of  the  injuries  he  suffered 
from  the  witches  who  made  him  their  nag, 
riding  him  to  and  from  their  nightly  meetings, 
meanwhile  leaving  him  tied  to  a  tree,  which  he 
could  readily  identify  the  next  morning.  Thus 
grievously  tormented  by  night,  he  groaned  by 
day  under  the  dire  results  of  this  weird  ma 
lignity,  with  as  many  stitches  and  rheumatic 
cramps  as  Caliban  foretold  to  the  clowns  who 
provoked  the  revenge  of  his  master.  Now  this 
venerable  man,  having  "  come  down  to  us  from 
a  former  generation,"  was  sometimes  unex 
pectedly  exacting  in  clamoring  for  a  return  to 
the  wholesome  and  laudable  usages  that  ob 
tained  in  his  youth,  —  as  when  he  puzzled  the 
farmer's  daughter,  who  had  served  his  dinner 
in  a  tin  plate,  by  demanding  (in  the  spirit  of 
the  Roman  lyrist  forbidding  a  Persian  luxury 
of  attendance),  "Gal,  hain't  you  no  trencher?" 
and  after  meeting  the  handmaid's  vacant  look 


48  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

by  a  snort  of  disgust  which  fairly  made  her 
jump,  he  sternly  pronounced,  with  manly  in 
dependence,  "Then  gimme  a  chip!"  —  which 
service  was  meekly  rendered. 

The  talk  which  seasoned  the  meal  ran  upon 
topics  no  less  vivid  than  religion  and  politics, — 
the  conversational  staples  of  less  effete  circles 
than  such  as  weakly  exclude  these  firebrands 
of  debate.  The  prospects  of  the  national  par 
ties  were  freely  handled  ;  but  with  the  usual  ten 
dency  of  the  contemplative  rural  mind  to  revert 
to  pensive  meditation  upon  the  past,  the  glo 
rious  memory  of  the  immortal  log-cabin  cam 
paign,  with  its  abundant  flow  of  hard  cider,  was 
invoked  by  that  element  of  the  company  which 
had  long  been  known  to  the  manipulators  of 
local  elections  as  a  doubtful  quantity,  and  liable 
to  be  diverted  to  this  side  or  the  other  by  cer 
tain  quite  irrelevant  causes.  The  transition  from 
teetotal  principles  to  religious  speculations  was 
readily  made,  and  the  group  was  soon  engaging 
the  question  tentatively  propounded  by  the  phil 
osophical  Doctor  Billy,  "  How  do  you  take  the 
Bible?"  Various  replies  were  promptly  cho 
rused,  as  "  I  take  it  promiscuously,"  or  "  I  take 
the  Good  Book  by  and  large ;  "  but  the  Elder, 
waiving  his  prestige  as  spokesman,  suavely 
sought  to  entrap  his  neighbor  in  the  toils  of 
doubtful  disputations,  by  repeating  in  slow  and 
ponderous  tones,  "  Brother  Shearman,  how  do 


AT  A   SHEEP-WASHING.  49 

you  take  it?  The  good  word  is  with  you, 
sir." 

"  Well,  sir,"  replied  Brother  Shearman  with 
masterly  strategy,  "  I  take  the  Bible  literally,  as 
you  may  say,  from  Amen  to  Genesis/' 

The  momentary  pause  which  succeeded  to 
the  assumption  of  this  impregnably  orthodox 
position  was  suddenly  filled  by  the  sound  of 
voices  from  the  river,  singing  in  high  feminine 
tones,  and  with  fervent  emphasis,  — 

"  Oh,  brother,  ain't  you  g-1-a-a-d  you  've  got  your  soul 

converted? 
Oh,   sister,  ain't  you   g-1-a-a-d  you  've  got   your  soul 

converted  ?  " 

"  That 's  Grandmammy  Harley  to  a  T,"  re 
marked  Doctor  Billy  Hood  with  an  evident  air 
of  patronage ;  while  Elder  Bizzle's  brow  clouded 
with  a  sternness  which  could  imply  nothing  less 
serious  than  doctrinal  disapproval. 

The  rather  battered  craft  that  presently 
rounded  the  wooded  point  of  land  which  had 
covered  its  approach  was  seen  to  contain  the 
chief  singer,  a  woman  of  imposing  amplitude  of 
figure  and  a  tempest-tossed  countenance,  tur- 
baned  and  barefooted,  but  vigorously  keeping 
time  with  feet  and  hands  to  "  her  voice's  music," 
as  Sidney  says  of  his  young  Arcadian  shep 
herdess  ;  while  another  elderly  woman,  gaunt 
and  cynical  of  aspect,  yet  with  same  suggestion 
of  a  Yankee  Ophelia  in  a  certain  disorder  of 
.4 


50  SOUTH-COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

dress,  joined  in  occasionally,  as  she  rowed  with 
a  stern  and  aggressive  action ;  and  with  them 
was  a  delicate  girl  of  sixteen,  who  panted  at 
the  effort  of  bailing  out  the  leaky  boat,  as  she 
mingled  her  sweeter  notes  with  the  devotional 
outcries  of  her  grandam. 

Grandmammy  Harley  was  in  the  full  fervor 
of  the  very  last  of  her  campmccting  conversions. 
She  had  experienced  several  of  them,  but  was 
a  quiet  and  harmless  soul  in  the  intervals. 
When  not  playing  the  Pythoness  under  the 
stimulus  of  some  itinerant  Millcrite's  exhorta 
tions,  or  when,  as  she  more  picturesquely  de 
scribed  herself,  she  had  again  become  "  a  cold 
and  backslidin'  perfessor,"  she  made  a  steady 
and  efficient  farm  helper  on  such  occasions  as 
soap-boiling,  or  "killing,"  or  as  cook  in  the  stress 
of  haying-time ;  for  she  was  skilled  in  the  whole 
duty  of  woman  respecting  pies,  pickles,  and  pre 
serves,  having  been  brought  up  at  a  country 
tavern  that  was  managed  in  the  old-fashioned, 
easy-going,  free-handed  way;  and  she  was  not 
backward  in  tendering  advice  when  present  at 
the  celebration  of  kitchen  mysteries.  "  An  nef 
I  was  you,  Mis'  Hahzard,"  she  would  be  moved 
to  say,  in  the  deliberative  speech  of  her  merely 
work-a-day  phase  of  being,  "  I  'd  chuck  in  the 
t'  other  handful  o'  salt.  Salt  ain't  dreadful  salt 
this  year,"  she  would  add,  with  a  reflective  air. 

Her  daughter,  the  tall  spinster,  who  looked  as 


AT  A   SHEEP-WASHING.  5  I 

old  as  herself,  and  who  was  invariably  addressed 
in  her  native  community,  with  a  particularity 
that  savored  of  Russian  ceremony,  by  her  full 
title  of  Olive  Ida  Ann,  had  at  some  remote 
time  passed  through  an  experience  indefinitely 
described  by  the  tongue  of  neighborhood  gossip 
as  being  "  crossed  in  love,"  —  a  saving  clause 
which  was  always  charitably  recalled  in  excuse  for 
habits  and  notions  that  were,  as  the  same  privi 
leged  tongue  proclaimed,  "queer  as  crazy  Jane." 
A  fanciful  observer  might  have  found  in  her 
name  no  fortuitous  concourse  of  syllabic  atoms, 
but  a  prophecy  of  the  different  phases  of  her 
nature  and  experience.  "  Olive  "  stood  for  the 
exotic  tastes  and  traits  that  appeared  in  her 
flagrant  eccentricities,  "  Ida  "  was  a  reminder  of 
such  girlish  graces  as  her  youth  had  been  dow 
ered  withal,  and  "  Ann"  represented  the  long 
work-a-day  stretch  of  her  years,  the  dull  drudg 
eries  of  her  life,  and  its  deadly  monotony  of 
routine.  Perhaps  it  is  partly  in  an  unconscious 
need  of  change,  if  only  from  the  kitchen  to  the 
sick-room,  and  in  the  supreme  feminine  desire 
of  managing  and  ordering,  that  so  many  women 
of  her  type  and  condition  are  so  zealous  in  the 
neighborly  offices  of  nursing,  house-keeping,  and 
general  usefulness.  Olive  Ida  Ann's  energies 
were  appreciated  among  her  afflicted  acquaint 
ances,  and  despite  her  well-known  oddities  and 
rather  unconscionable  requirements,  she  was  at 


52  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

home  wherever  there  was  suffering;  or,  as  she 
more  vigorously  expressed  it,  she  "  could  n't  set 
still  waiting  for  the  skies  to  rain  porridge,  when 
there  was  folks  to  be  done  for."  Not  content 
with  serving  her  convalescent  patients,  she  knew 
no  shrinking  from  those  last  offices  which  re 
mained  to  be  rendered  to  such  as  had  passed 
beyond  hope  of  recall  to  human  activities.  Her 
muscular  arms  and  toil-marked  hands  were  so 
closely  associated  with  the  grim  services  which 
she  tendered  almost  too  readily,  and  to  which 
she  referred  with  the  rugged  freedom  of  her 
class,  as  to  make  her  presence  such  an  oppres 
sive  memento  inori  as  sufficed  to  dash  the  spirits 
of  weakly  sensitive  people.  Why  is  it  that  the 
same  conditions  that  form  the  background  of 
the  refined  and  picturesque  figure  of  the  Sister 
of  Charity  are  so  obtrusive  when  viewed  as  the 
surroundings  of  the  untrained,  unrecognized 
Yankee  nurse  and  village  Samaritan?  Perhaps 
the  clothes-philosophy  may  afford  a  hint  towards 
the  solution  of  this  minor  problem;  and  possi 
bly  the  daughter  of  Rome  owes  to  her  veil  and 
scapulary  that  halo  of  sentiment  which  fails  to 
grace  our  worthy  neighbor's  sunbonnet  and 
apron.  Olive  Ida  Ann's  surplus  activities 
were  expended  upon  flowers,  for  which  she  had 
a  positive  devotion,  and  she  toiled  at  unseason 
able  hours  of  dawn  and  twilight  among  the  beds 
of  scarlet  lychnis,  sweet-william,  and  mullein 


AT  A   SHEEP-WASHIXG.  53 

pink,  that  brightened  her  beloved  garden.  The 
figure  of  the  maiden  gardener,  herself  the  fair 
est  flower,  is  one  that  cannot  be  spared  from 
poetry ;  but  mistaken  would  be  that  observer  of 
actual  rustic  life  who  should  credit  the  daugh 
ters  of  a  village  with  any  large  share  in  the  de 
velopment  of  its  floral  attractions.  These  lovely 
young  persons  are  far  too  much  occupied  with 
adornments  of  a  strictly  personal  character  to 
consider  the  lilies  of  the  field  or  the  garden. 
No,  it  is  almost  invariably  the  old  and  trem 
bling  grandam,  the  middle-aged  widow,  or  the 
ancient  spinster,  who  dedicates  herself  to  the 
service  of  nature  and  the  worship  of  beauty, — 
though  these  fine  phrases  do  a  manifest  injustice 
to  the  loving  simplicity  of  their  maternal  nur 
ture  of  those  childlike  creatures,  the  flowers. 
Olive  Ida  Ann  was  an  adept  in  wood-lore,  and 
she  had  in  charge  the  baskets  which  were  to  be 
filled  with  sassafras,  and  other  woodland  growths, 
for  the  brewing  of  the  root-and-herb  beer,  and 
the  concoction  of  the  bitter  tonic  drink  in 
tended  for  the  use  of  the  orphaned  sick  girl, 
K&line,  as  she  was  known  to  her  grandmother 
and  aunt. 

Ad'line  had  possessed  her  full  share  of  that 
delicate  prettiness  which  in  many  village  girls 
reaches  its  brightest  bloom  at  fifteen  or  sixteen ; 
and  even  now,  in  the  gentle  decline  which,  su 
perinduced  by  a  fever,  advanced  so  impercep- 


54  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

tibly  as  to  be  mistaken  by  herself  and  her 
friends  for  a  tedious  convalescence,  or,  as  they 
said,  "  a  real  poor  getting  up,"  the  pure  tones 
of  the  touching  paleness  of  her  face  —  its  slightly 
accentuated  outlines  softened  by  the  mass  of 
rich,  dark-red  curls,  of  a  solid  roundness,  like 
the  heavy  ringlets  treated  with  such  realistic 
care  in  Assyrian  reliefs  —  were  not  without  the 
lingering  charm  of  a  vitality  which  still  reigned 
in  the  lustre  and  coloring  of  the  hair  and  the 
wine-dark  eyes.  Among  her  associates  and 
occasional  schoolmates,  like  Benjy,  the  well- 
made  and  frank-faced  youth  who  acted  as  the 
Elder's  helper,  no  disappointment  was  felt  at 
Ad'line's  immobility  of  feature,  for  they  all 
shared  the  same  rustic  fixity  of  expression. 
Said  an  observer,  who  was  piqued  as  a  man 
and  baffled  as  an  artist  by  the  "  freezing  grav 
ity"  of  a  Greek  princess  whose  portrait  he 
painted  at  Constantinople,  "  Her  small  mouth 
and  deep-colored  lips  might  be  embellished  with 
smiles,  but  I  never  had  the  pleasure  to  see 
them."  Now  Ad'line,  without  being  a  subject 
for  the  restrictions  of  court  etiquette,  was  yet 
not  unlike  this  haughty  beauty,  for  smiles  she 
had  none.  Her  laughter  was  ready  enough  when 
anything  seemed  funny,  but  the  angel  of  smiles 
and  dimples  had  never  troubled  the  waters  of 
her  serene  young  soul.  She  had  played  for  a 
brief  childish  hour  in  the  shallows  of  existence, 


AT   A   SHEEP-WASHING.  55 

and  she  was  soon  to  go  down  in  the  deep 
waters  of  death  without  ever  having  known  the 
meaning  of  life.  But  no  shadow  of  this  darken 
ing  fate  touched  her  with  any  sense  of  the  ad 
verse  that  appeared  in  voice  or  manner.  She 
showed  only  that  slight  languor  of  illness  that 
lends  something  of  the  repose  of  breeding  to 
the  most  untaught,  as  she  met  her  late  school 
fellow  "with  a  frank  "  How  d'  do,  Benjy."  Her 
sweet  gravity  almost  gave  her  the  air  of  having 
said,  "  How  does  thee  do?"  like  a  maiden  not 
of  the  world's  people;  and  Benjy,  who  had 
been  furtively  brushing  aside  the  crumbs  of 
his  repast,  and  spurring  up  his  rather  unprac 
tised  social  powers,  essayed  to  reply  in  tones 
that  should  be  manly,  but  kindly,  cheerful,  and 
cordial,  "  How  d  'do,  Ad'line?  How  be  you?" 
But  the  result  fell  so  far  below  his  anticipations 
that  without  a  word  more  he  disappeared  in  the 
wood,  whence  he  presently  emerged  bringing 
a  vast  armful  of  sassafras-saplings  with  the  ease 
of  one  of  Milton's  warlike  young  angels  bearing 
his  uprooted  pine,  and  was  quite  satisfied  that 
the  object  of  this  devotion  accepted  the  offering 
with  a  mildly  pleased  expression  that  was  equiv 
alent  to  a  smile. 

"Ad'line,"  urged  the  now  emboldened  Benjy, 
"don't  you  want  to  ride  a  piece?  I  ben  work 
ing  on  the  jump  all  the  forenoon,  and  I  '11  get 
Jakey  to  spell  me  while  I  go  over  and  tackle  up, 


$6  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

and  I  '11  take  you  and  your  folks  right  up  to 
Broad  Hill.  There's  roots  enough  up  there." 

"  No,  I  cahn't,  Benjy,"  returned  Ad'line,  un 
compromisingly.  "  Olive  Ida  Ann  would  n't 
stir  a  step.  She  says  she  won't  be  beholden 
to  men  folks  for  nothing." 

"  Good  land !  "  ejaculated  Bcnjy,  with  such 
a  foolish  face  of  wonder  at  this  declaration  of 
independence  that  Ad'line  laughed  aloud. 

While  this  idyllic  scene  was  in  progress,  Grand- 
mammy  had  been  challenging  the  Elder,  her 
long-time  theological  foe,  to  a  passage-at-arms. 
She  had  no  sooner  caught  sight  of  that  Attila  of 
the  "  no-souled  Advents,"  as  he  sternly  desig 
nated  them,  than  her  visage  brightened  for  battle. 
Planting  her  footsteps  firmly  on  the  bank,  and 
leaving  to  Olive  Ida  Ann  the  sole  care  of  their 
craft,  she,  not  unlike  a  threatening  ship-of-war 
with  fighting  signals  all  set,  bore  down  heavily 
upon  the  group  of  feasters. 

"  So  it  was,"  she  accosted  them,  a  tremor  of 
emotion  agitating  her  ample  draperies,  and  with 
a  menacing  wave  of  her  substantial  arm,  "  So  it 
was,  even  in  the  Gentile  days,  when  the  children 
of  wrath  sat  down  to  riot  and  carouse,  and  rose 
up  to  play.  And  my  arrant  to  you  is,  look  out 
for  jedgment,  for  the  day  is  to  come." 

"  Well,  if  ever  I  heerd  sich  a  lurry,"  announced 
Brother  Shearman,  in  an  evident  transport  of  dis 
gust,  but  uttering  his  indignation  in  the  sluggish 


AT  A   SHEEP-WASHING. 

accents  of  the  slow-moving,  deliberative  tillers 
of  the  soil;  and  "What  mought  be  your  mind, 
Elder,  on  them  p'ints?"  querulously  begged 
Gamper  Boose,  thrown  into  a  senile  tremor  by 
this  portentous  apparition,  and  involuntarily  dip 
ping  his  gingerbread  into  a  quite  unnecessary 
bath  of  molasses. 

Neither  of  the  opponents  thus  pitted  at  each 
other  took  any  direct  notice  of  these  appeals ; 
but  Grandmammy  continued,  "  I  tell  'um,"  her 
rotund  notes  rising  higher,  "  the  Lord  He 's 
coming  in  power  and  glory,  in  heighth  and 
mighth,  to  rend  and  to  slay;  and  He'll  shake 
the  dry  bones  of  you,"  she  suddenly  ended,  with 
scorn  expressed  in  every  line  of  her  ample  pro 
portions,  and  wheeling  sharply  upon  the  withered 
and  sapless  Elder,  who  tried  to  look  as  callous 
as  possible  under  the  consciousness  of  the  stifled 
mirth  among  the  younger  of  the  company  that 
bore  involuntary  testimony  to  the  point  of  the 
personal  application. 

"  No,  Brother  Shearman,"  observed  the  Elder 
bitterly,  in  a  tone  of  unnecessary  loudness, 
and  with  a  labored  air  of  ignoring  his  antagonist, 
at  the  same  time  rising,  as  a  signal  to  resume 
work,  "  I  don't  feel  no  call  to  dispoot  these  here 
things  with  backsliders  and  women-folks." 

An  approving  murmur  rose  among  the  Elder's 
followers,  swelling  to  a  confused  noise  of  angry 
agitation,  much  like  the  threatening  buzz  of  a 


psem^ 


58  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

swarm,  and  strongly  indicating  the  instant  pro 
mulgation  of  an  edict  of  banishment  against 
Grandmammy  and  her  unpalatable  doctrines. 
The  pseudo  Hutchinson  turned  with  dignity 
to  her  silent  supporter,  Olive  Ida  Ann,  —  who, 
with  consummate  indifference  to  the  maternal 
outpourings,  had  been  all  the  time  champing  dry 
twigs  like  a  ruminating  griffin,  —  and  abruptly 
issued  her  marching  orders.  "  Ad'linc  !  "  called 
her  aunt  in  thin  staccato  tones,  and  the  girl 
obeyed,  only  once  frankly  turning  to  look  back. 
Benjy,  if  the  glance  were  meant  for  him,  knew 
nothing  of  it,  for  he  was  just  then  facing  the 
river,  as  he  went  toward  the  Elder,  every  muscle 
set  to  his  task  of  carrying  a  particularly  weighty 
and  cumbersome  old  sheep.  But  it  may  be  that 
he  heard  with  some  undefined  pleasure  the  ring 
of  a  girlish  treble  in  the  notes  of  pious  song  that 
floated  down  to  the  workers  from  the  retreating 
trio,  as  they  paused  in  their  search  for  simples 
on  the  breezy  heights  of  the  hill  pasture,  and 
united  in  a  burst  of  fervent  hymnody :  — 

"  Oh  !  we  '11  have  a  shout  in  glory, 
And  the  saints  '11  mount  the  air." 


AILSE   CONGDON. 

AILSE  CONGDON,  whose  inappropriately 
musical  name  of  Alice  her  neighbors, 
with  intuitive  recognition  of  her  salient  charac 
teristics,  invariably  reduced  to  a  curt  monosylla 
ble,  was  a  quick-stepping  woman,  with  snapping 
black  eyes,  and  a  tightly-set  mouth.  Nature's 
danger-signals,  reading,  "  Ware  the  Shrew," 
might  plainly  be  discerned  in  her  face  and  mien. 
She  was  a  scold  and  a  housewife,  as  some  of 
her  fellow-creatures  have  been  artists,  —  by  the 
force  of  an  irresistible,  innate  impulse. 

There  must  be  a  place  in  the  economy  of 
nature  for  the  vixen,  no  less  than  for  the  gad 
fly.  Such  a  restless,  wiry,  shrill,  unflagging 
impersonation  of  steely  energy  as  the  indefati 
gable  Ailse  Congdon  was  needed  in  an  untidy 
rustic  community,  careless  about  its  gate-fasten 
ings,  and  indifferent  to  the  condition  of  its  door- 
yards.  She  did  a  good  work  when  she  stung 
her  neighbors  into  the  better  civilization  of  a 
more  thorough  neatness  and  order.  She  might 
indeed  think  that  she  did  well  to  be  angered  at 
the  habits  of  unthrift  in  the  revolt  from  which 


60  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

her  temper  had  been  cankered.  Born  of  a 
drunkard  father  and  a  weak-natured,  inefficient 
mother,  the  sentiment  of  reverence  was  easily 
uprooted  from  the  thin  soil  which  her  harsh 
nature  supplied  for  its  growth.  Struggling  all 
her  life  with  the  adverse  conditions  of  an  imper 
fect  world  of  original  sin  and  dust,  of  moths  and 
rheumatics,  of  spring  cleanings  and  fall  fevers, 
what  wonder  if,  having  been,  as  she  said,  always 
in-  a  pickle,  she  should  partake  of  the  tartness  of 
her  surroundings?  "Father,  he  was  a  poor 
shoat,"  she  would  say  with  stern  truthfulness,  to 
Huldy  Pawn,  her  bound  girl  from  the  town 
farm,  "  and  mother  had  n't  sca'ce  ever  any 
ambition.  I  never  got  no  chance  to  what  you  '11 
get  here,  and  you  oughter  sing  praise  be  to 
Canaan  all  your  days  to  think  you  've  got  a 
home  with  me,  f  r  if  I  live  I  '11  larn  you  some 
thing  afore  I  git  through  with  you." 

Huldy  Pawn  received  these  and  sundry  more 
searching  admonitions  with  a  staring-eyed  and 
wooden-jointed  obedience  which  gave  her  the 
air  of  a  Dutch  doll.  A  foundling  of  no  romantic 
antecedents,  a  waif  cast  upon  the  reluctant  chari 
ties  of  the  town,  a  helpless  pawn  on  life's 
checker-board,  it  was  her  destiny  to  become  the 
satellite  of  that  .ruling  planet,  Ailse  Congdon. 
Poor  Huldy  was  of  feeble  intellect,  or,  in  the 
vernacular,  she  was  "not  all  there,"-— a  phrase 
which  concisely  indicated  the  poverty  of  the 


AILSE  CONGDON.  6 1 

under-vitalized  organization  which  confessed  its 
needs  in  the  weak  eyes,  cold  hands,  and  thin, 
ash-colored  hair  of  the  weazen-faced  handmaid, 
whose  sixteen  years  had  dowered  her  but  scan 
tily  with  the  graces  of  youth. 

Ailse  Congdon  followed  the  trade  of  a  tailor- 
ess,  —  that  calling  to  which  the  capable  and 
strong-minded  woman  who  scorns  the  flimsy 
avocations  of  dress-making  and  millinery  natur 
ally  turns.  Huldy  kept  the  house,  or,  as  Ailse 
contemptuously  said,  "  puttered  'round  "  in  her 
absences  among  her  employers,  but  never  de 
veloped  a  spark  of  independent  spirit  in  conse 
quence  of  these  interruptions  of  surveillance. 
The  charitably-disposed  often  said  that  it  was 
clear  goodness  in  Ailse  Congdon,  giving  Huldy 
her  keep  when  she  did  n't  need  her  no  more 
than  a  coach  needs  a  fifth  wheel;  but  others 
were  shrewdly  inclined  to  believe  that  the  rea 
son  why  Ailse  would  n't  let  her  go  was  because 
of  her  love  of  domineering,  or,  as  they  said,  she 
wanted  to  have  somebody  under  her  thumb. 
The  condition  of  a  ruler  without  a  subject  was  a 
point  of  bathos  to  which  the  mind  of  our  ener 
getic  housewife  had  never  descended. 

The  house  in  which  these  two  women  grew, 
one  into  years,  and  the  other  into  a  sickly 
maturity  which  more  than  kept  pace  with  the 
hale  age  of  the  elder,  was  the  same  humble 
homestead  that  had  been  left  in  a  rickety  condi- 


62  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

tion  by  that  luckless  wight,  the  drunken  father 
of  Ailse,  who  finally  had  the  grace  to  get  him 
self  drowned  from  his  fishing-boat.  The  patient 
thrift  and  care  of  long  years  had  so  reclaimed  it 
that  it  remained  in  a  state  of  partially  arrested 
decay.  The  lean-to  was  a  little  too  suggestive 
of  a  fall-down  as  it  rested  helplessly  against  the 
rough-hewn  stone  chimney,  and  the  roof  sank 
away  between  the  gables  as  the  heart  of  a 
man  knocks  at  his  ribs  when  speedy  collapse 
threatens.  But  it  was  a  very  neat  and  habitable 
ruin,  after  all,  as  no  one  could  doubt  who  knew 
the  potent  housewifery  of  its  mistress.  It  stood 
half-cornerwise,  with  no  particular  reference  to 
the  road  or  anything  else,  in  that  quarter  of  the 
little  home-lot  which  had  been  chosen  as  most 
convenient  for  digging  a  cellar.  The  hand- 
breadth  of  dooryard,  though  never  adorned  by 
shrub  or  flower,  was  always  guiltless  of  litter,  its 
short  grass  being  fiercely  swept,  as  it  were  in  a 
rage  of  industry,  by  Ailse  and  Huldy,  with  the 
birch  brooms  brought  to  the  door  by  the  sullen 
lords  of  the  Charlestown  squaws,  who,  at  other 
seasons,  tramped  with  baskets  which  they  were 
too  prone  to  barter  for  New-England  rum,  return 
ing  safe  to  their  reservation  only  by  the  favor  of 
those  merciful  chances  that  wait  on  the  gypsy 
train.  No  tree  stood  as  comrade  to  the  old 
square-hewn  chimney,  for  the  ancient  willow 
had  been  condemned  by  Ailse,  owing  to  an 


AILSE  CONGDON.  63 

inveterate  habit  of  shedding  its  leaves  ;  and  the 
sentence  pronounced  upon  it,  in  which  the  fine 
old  clump  of  incense-breathing  box  was  in 
cluded,  because  anathematized  by  its  owner  as 
saluting  her  nostrils  with  "  a  pizen  smell,"  was 
gloatingly  executed  by  the  occasional  factotum 
of  the  household,  Izrul  Barnes  by  name,  farm- 
laborer  by  calling,  and  tree-butcher  by  taste 
and  inclination. 

Izrul  really  stood  in  a  wholesome  awe  of  his 
energetic  employer,  though  he  affected  a  manly 
independence  when  off  the  premises,  asserting 
with  a  large  plurality  of  expression,  that  Ailse 
Congdon  mought  skeer  her  Huldy  Pawnses,  but 
she  couldn't  drive  no  Barneses.  His  relations 
with  the  hand-maid  were  naturally  more  familiar, 
and  Huldy  served  as  the  irresponsive  object  of 
those  colloquial  attentions  which  provoked 
Ailse  Congdon  to  many  a  sharp  comment  on 
Izrul  Barnes's  long  tongue. 

"  Say,  Huldy,  I  Ve  brung  in  y'r  wood,"  he 
announced  from  the  shed,  as  a  signal  for  that 
damsel  to  appear,  armed  with  turkey-wing  and 
dust-pan,  to  remove  any  traces  of  his  footsteps ; 
and  while  she  was  thus  employed,  and  he  busied 
himself  outside  with  the  repair  of  a  disabled 
saw-horse,  he  attempted  a  little  gossip  about 
Huldy's  quondam  pastor,  the  Elder  of  a  meeting 
to  which  she  had  been  admitted  in  a  heated  re 
vival  season,  her  grim  guardian  merely  observing 


64  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

that "  Huldy  'd  be  a  worse  fool  than  she  took  her 
for  if  she  stayed  with  such  a  do-little  set  as  them 
was.  If  they  ever  brought  anything  to  pass,  she 
never  knowed  it."  In  fact,  Huldy,  after  once 
meeting  with  them  "  to  break  bread,"  retired 
from  membership,  alleging  to  Ailse  Congdon 
that  the  loaf  used  in  the  sacred  service  was  of  so 
poor  a  quality  as  to  cast  discredit  upon  the 
occasion  and  the  church. 

"  Say,  Huldy,"  resumed  the  cheerful  Izrul,  in 
his  invariable  preliminary  manner,  "  I  carr'd  a 
load  o'  wood  down  to  Ponder  Zeke's  Corners 
las'  week,  V  I  see  Elder  Springer  a  kitin'  along 
the  road." 

He  paused  as  Huldy  made  a  vigorous  dash  at 
an  intruding  hen,  which,  from  furtively  tiptoeing 
about,  broke  into  an  affrighted  flutter  and  cac 
kle,  as  she  fled  before  swift-handed  justice. 

"  Berried  his  wife,  y'  know,  three  months  ago 
come  nex'  Sa'a'd'y,"  continued  Izrul,  in  a  sly 
drawl.  "  The  Elder,  he  looks  ez  chipper  ez  a 
crow-blackbird  in  plantin'  time.  Seems  to  be 
all  took  up  'ith  visitin'  his  people.  Tell  ye  what, 
Huldy,  you  better  sprunt  up,  'n'  fly  roun',  'n' 
wear  y'r  bettermost  gownd  all  day.  Look  out 
f  r  what  chance  the'  is,  ye  know,  ez  ole  Marm 
Chaffell  said  to  her  blind  gal." 

"  I  don'  want  no  Elder  Springer,"  fretted  the 
feeble-minded  one,  under  a  dim  sense  of  some 
thing  sinister  in  Izrul's  cajoleries.  "  Folks  say 


AILSE  CONGDON.  '  65 

you  'd  better  think  o1  gettin'  married  yourself, 
Izrul." 

"  So  I  do,  darter,  so  I  do,"  returned  old  Izrul, 
soothingly;  "and  every  time  I  think  on't,  I 
think  I  won't,"  he  pursued,  ruminatively. 

"  'T  ain't  no  such  smart  doings  to  get  mar 
ried,"  asserted  Huldy,  with  confidence.  "  Ailse 
Congdon,  she  ain't  married." 

"  Wai,  I  sort  o'  thought  she  was  onct,"  hinted 
Izrul. 

"  'T  wan't  none  to  speak  on,  anyway,"  tartly 
returned  the  satellite,  leaving  the  woodshed 
with  a  fling. 

But  it  was  true  that  Ailse  Congdon,  though 
always  known  by  her  maiden  name,  had  a  legal 
right  to  bear  that  of  Jim  Castle,  the  young 
woodsman  to  whom  she  had  been  united  in  her 
girlhood  by  the  local  Justice  of  the  Peace.  Six 
months  of  wedded  warfare  sufficed  to  convince 
.the  rather  hasty  and  self-willed  Jim,  as  his 
bride  explained,  with  what  was  pronounced  a 
callous  indifference  to  "  the  speech  of  people," 
that  "  he  guessed  he  'd  ruther  stay  with  his  own 
folks,  and  she  would  n't  lift  a  finger  agin  it." 
Jim  had  failed  to  live  up  to  the  one  great  article 
of  religion  which  possessed  the  soul  of  Ailse 
Congdon,  and  with  which  she  had  informed  that 
of  her  handmaid,  that  houses  are  the  great,  sol 
emn,  cardinal  facts  of  life,  the  shrines  on  which 
the  oblation  of  human  wills  and  energies  must 
5 


66  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

be  laid.  Dress  fills  the  aspirations  of  some 
women,  but  it  was  the  sterner  ideal  of  house 
wifery  that  was  all  in  all  with  Ailse  Congdon. 
As  the  fine  lady  in  the  "  Bread  Winners  "  is  con 
soled  in  her  widowhood  by  gaining  the  use  of  a 
double  amount  of  wardrobe-room  for  her  sum 
mer  and  winter  gowns,  so  Ailse  Congdon  looked 
at  her  tidy,  unlittered  rooms,  and  thought  that 
Jim  was  a  good  riddance;  "she  didn't  better 
herself,  noways,  when  she  took  him."  Perhaps 
she  was  not  intentionally  hard  and  severe,  but 
she  was  of  so  intensely  practical  and  matter-of- 
fact  a  nature,  so  incapable  of  the  rudest  form  of 
imaginative  sympathy,  that  if  not  actually  in 
human,  she  was  certainly  a  little  less  than 
human. 

Jim's  absence  had  not  been  prolonged  many 
months  when  he  was  killed  by  the  fall  of  a  tree 
which  he  was  cutting  down.  The  newly-made 
widow  received  the  news  with  composure,  sim 
ply  saying  to  the  messenger  that  "  she  always 
told  Jim  he  did  n't  have  headpiece  for  that  sorter 
work,  and  that  a  tree  would  fall  on  him  some 
day,  and  ruin  him."  She  duly  attended  the  fu 
neral,  and  observed  to  Huldy  on  her  return,  in  a 
spirit  of  relenting  toward  the  departed,  that  "she 
did  n't  wonder,  come  to  see  more  of  his  folks, 
that  poor  Jim  was  so  head  fo'most  about  every 
thing.  She  should  think,  by  the  looks  of  things, 
they'd  had  a  hull  beef  critter  cut  up,  and  sich 


AILSE   CONGDON.  67 

porridge  as  them  was,  she  would  n't  set  afore  a 
Turk." 

Ailse  Congdon  reached  an  iron  old  age  with 
out  ever  having  known  serious  illness ;  and  when 
death  came,  it  was  after  a  short  and  sharp  course 
of  pneumonia,  brought  on  by  the  rigid  observance 
of  her  usual  rule  of  having  no  fire  in  the  house 
after  the  spring  cleaning  was  done.  As  she 
knitted  and  shivered  in  her  icily  clean  keeping- 
room  one  May  evening,  Death  struck  her  in  the 
side  with  his  dart,  as  in  the  engraving  in  the  old 
copy  of  the  "  Night  Thoughts  "  which  slept  un 
disturbed,  except  to  be  dusted,  with  the  half-dozen 
other  volumes  which  had  descended  to  her,  and 
which  she  had  been  too  thrifty  to  destroy.  When 
she  rolled  up  her  blue  yarn  stocking  that  night, 
her  life's  work  was  done,  and  the  useful  hands 
were  to  lie  idle  until  they  should  be  folded  away 
out  of  sight  forever. 

But  their  owner  was  not  one  to  give  up  the 
warfare  of  life  in  a  tame  and  spiritless  fashion. 
From  her  sick-bed  she  could  see  into  the  kitchen, 
and  was  still  capable  of  scolding  an  hour  by  the 
eight-day  clock,  if  Huldy,  in  the  flurry  of  her 
spirits,  hung  the  skimmer  on  the  wrong  nail. 
The  Elder,  who  came  to  ask  her  if  she  was  pre 
pared  for  a  change,  met  with  a  vigorous  retort 
from  the  sick  woman,  who,  raising  herself  on  her 
elbow  the  better  to  transfix  the  intruder  with 
her  steely  glance,  informed  him,  "  I  'd  have  you 


68  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

to  know  that  we  're  a  very  long-lived  family,  and 
if  you  hain't  nothing  but  that  to  say,  you  'd  bet 
ter  go  back  where  you  come  from." 

Her  next  visitor  was  Aunt  Hepsey  Dempsey, 
a  well-meaning  old  Quakeress,  who  always  had 
a  mission  to  the  dying.  It  was  equivalent  to  a 
death-warrant  to  see  her  grotesque  little  lame 
figure,  making  its  halting  approach  to  your 
bed-side.  Sometimes  the  sick  proved  docile 
enough  under  her  ministrations,  —  as  when  she 
piously  inquired  of  an  aged  hewer  of  wood  and 
drawer  of  water,  "  Zeb,  is  thee  ready  to  die  and 
go  to  heaven  ? "  and  the  old  negro  with  the 
humility  of  his  servile  race  faltered,  "  Ye-es, 
Miss  Hepsey,  if  so  be  as  I  can't  do  no  better;  " 
thus  voicing  the  unexpressed  sentiment  of  many 
excellent  people  who  seem  in  marvellous  little 
haste  to  go  to  a  place  that  is  always-  well 
spoken  of.  But  when,  in  her  usual  formula, 
she  desired  to  know  of  Ailse  Congdon,  "  Is  thee 
resigned  to  die?"  her  words  were  flung  back 
at  her. 

"  Resigned  to  die !  "  cried  the  poor  soul, 
with  such  panting  breath  "as  remained  to  her; 
"  d  'you  think,  Friend  Dempsey,  that  anybody 
oughter  be  resigned  to  die  with  the  sullar  only 
half  cleaned  and  the  back  yard  not  cleared 
up?" 

The  prudent  benevolence  of  the  neighbor 
hood  was  much  concerned  in  behalf  of  the 


AILSE  CONGDON.  69 

prospectively  destitute  Huldy,  and,  in  view  of 
the  fact  that  Ailse  Congdon  had  neither  chick 
nor  child  of  her  own,  she  was  urged  to  leave 
the  little  homestead  to  her  faithful  help,  rather 
than  to  the  relatives,  among  whom  she  had  none 
nearer  than  some  half-cousins  of  the  third  de 
gree,  upon  whom  she  had  always  looked  with 
an  eye  of  disfavor.  But  now  she  turned  to  her 
own,  as  so  often  happens  at  the  last,  was  cyni 
cally  disgusted  with  Huldy's  tears  and  alarms, 
and  grumbled  at  leaving  her  all  to  town's  poor 
of  uncertain  parentage.  The  pressure  upon  her 
was  continued,  however,  until  she  finally  gave 
way,  rather  to  the  benumbing  influence  of 
death's  narcotics  than  to  neighborly  persua 
sion,  and  consented  to  sign  the  will  'prepared 
for  her  by  the  ever-busy  Squire  Codgers,  a 
fussy,  self-important  little  man,  who  by  brevet 
title  and  volunteer  service  was  the  neighbor 
hood  notary,  and  was  in  great  request  for  mak 
ing  out  your  deed  or  drawing  your  will  at  much 
cheaper  rates  than  you  could  get  it  done  by 
the  legal  profession.  Ailse  Congdon  had  been 
scornfully  wont  to  describe  this  learned  neigh 
bor  as  "the  lightest  kind  o'  timber,"  but  she 
accepted  his  proffered  offices  with  an  unnatural 
taciturnity,  and  never  spoke  again  after  his  visit. 
So,  as  has  been  said  of  another,  the  poor  creat 
ure  was  mercifully  chloroformed  by  the  hand 
of  Nature  into  a  better  world,  where  she  could 


70  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

drink  from  healing  fountains  and  feed  on  strange 
fruits,  with  virtue  to  make  her  over,  even  to  her 
bones  and  marrow.  No  less  radical  a  change 
could  work  the  miracle  of  creating  a  soul  of 
womanliness  in  the  rugged  nature  of  an  Ailse 
Congdon. 

The  funeral  followed  in  due  course,  with  the 
arrival  of  the  chief  of  the  clan  of  cousins,  deco 
rously  summoned  by  the  neighbors,  who  had 
now  no  fear  of  his  claims,  though  he  was  well- 
known  to  have  come  sharp-set  for  the  property. 
In  the  language  of  his  recital  to  an  admiring 
auditory  in  the  grocery  store  of  his  native  village, 
on  his  return,  he  "went  right  slap  to  work,  sir, 
to  overhaul  things ;  "  and  he  overhauled  them  to 
such  purpose  that  he  found  a  flaw  in  the  work 
of  the  amateur  lawyer,  got  the  will  set  aside, ! 
and  took  possession  of "  the  estate  and  effects 
of  the  deceased,"  as  he  complacently  described 
the  lean-to  homestead  and  its  contents,  includ 
ing  the  scanty  wardrobe,  which  he  reserved  for 
the  harpies  of  his  family,  excepting  one  of  his 
kinswoman's  oldest  gowns  which  "  he  did  n't  care 
if  Huldy  Pawn  had,  being  as  he  did  n't  hold  her 
responsible." 

"  It 's  allers  bottom  up'ards  'ith  my  dish 
when  't  rains  porridge,"  wailed  the  poor  creat 
ure,  with  a  felicity  of  diction  borrowed  from 
the  vivid  vocabulary  of  her  life-companion ; 
and,  "  Huldy,  I  vow  for't!  You  have  carr'd  y'r 


AILSE   CONGDON.  /I 

pigs  to  a  poor  market !  "  was  Izrul  Barnes's 
sympathetic  commentary  upon  the  hard  usage 
of  a  fate  which  threw  her  upon  the  world  just 
when  her  infirm,  or,  as  her  late  employer  had 
been  wont  to  say,  her  "  slack-twisted  "  constitu 
tion  was  failing  under  the  stress  of  time.  She 
drifted  about  from  house  to  house  for  a  while, 
finding  no  home  where  her  subserviency  would 
be  taken  as  an  equivalent  for  board;  for  with 
the  displacement  from  her  accustomed  sur 
roundings,  her  hand  had  quite  lost  its  cunning 
in  the  routine-work  which  she  had  accomplished 
under  the  searching  eye  of  her  mistress.  Los 
ing  her  head  entirely  for  the  time,  she  tramped 
about  the  country  until  neighborhood  charity 
would  tolerate  her  no  longer,  and  she  had 
become  "  chargeable  to  the  town."  To  the 
town-farm  then,  whence  she  came,  she  was 
returned ;  and,  upon  being  accepted  as  a  town 
charge,  began  to  develop  the  mysterious  vitality 
of  a  pensioner,  actually  living  to  a  great  age, 
in  which  she  often  made  the  immaculate  house 
wifery  of  her  early  patroness  the  theme  of  her 
praises. 

"  Ailse  Congdon  was  a  faculized  woman," 
she  would  say,  in  regretful  memory  of  her 
kitchen.  "  She  could  n't  have  things  flush,  but 
she  was  one  o'  them  that  gits  a  livin'  off'n  a 
rock.  And  when  you  come  to  neat! — why, 
you  mighter  gone  all  over  her  house,  and  you 


72  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

could  n't  took  up  a  tcaspoonful  o'  dirt.  She 
never  let  a  drop  o"  the  cleanest  water  stan'  a 
minute  on  her  kitchen-floor ;  'n'  lawsey !  how 
she  uster  keep  scoldin'  me,  in  my  young  days, 
and  a  tellin'  me  how  that  any  woman  that 
did  n't  keep  a  shine  onto  her  teakittle  had 
oughter  be  buried  alive !  " 

With  this  fitting  obituary  we  will  suffer  the 
shade  of  Ailse  Congdon  to  pass. 


AN  AFTERNOON  AT  NEIGHBOR 
NORTHUP  'S. 


TVTEIGHBOR  NORTHUP'S  gambrel-roofed, 
1  ^1  weather-beaten,  wood-colored  homestead 
of  one  story  and  a  loft  might  almost  have  been 
mistaken  for  a  deserted  dwelling,  so  riotous  was 
the  profusion  of  catnip  and  other  fat  weeds  that 
flourished  in  the  waste  places  of  the  house-lot, 
and  so  tall  were  the  door-yard  grasses  that 
nodded  familiarly  at  the  window  of  "  the  gret 
room,"  as  the  diminutive  parlor  was  desig 
nated,  —  "  great  "  being  an  adjective  not  of  size, 
but  of  state.  But  a  faintly-marked,  grassy  foot 
path  led  from  the  rickety  front  gate  to  the  rough- 
hewn  stone  that  lay  at  the  "green  'fore-door,"  — 
that  being  the  conventional  color  of  a  princi 
pal  house  door,  —  and  a  more  frequented  way 
ended  at  the  kitchen  entrance,  where  Neighbor 
Northup  sat  smoking  a  peaceable  pipe,  and 
lending  a  condescending  ear  to  the  gossip  of  her 
meek  henchwoman,  the  Widow  Bill  B.,  as  she  was 
lucidly  styled,  to  distinguish  her  from  the  equally 
bereaved  Widow  Bill  D.,  of  the  same  ultimate 
family  name.  The  Widow  Bill,  who  had  arrived 


74  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

at  half-past  two  o'clock  to  spend  the  afternoon 
and  stay  to  tea,  with  many  apologies  for  not  be 
ing  able  to  come  early,  was  solacing  herself,  in 
her  feebler  fashion,  by  an  occasional  resort  to 
her  snuff-box;  and  both  women  knitted  vigor 
ously  at  stockings  of  homespun  blue-dyed  yarn. 
That  excellent  person,  the  Widow,  'resembled 
nothing  so  much  as  an  ancient  and  battered  doll. 
The  hand  of  time  had  dealt  with  her  meaningless 
features  as  cruelly  as  the  equally  ruthless  hand 
of  childhood  deals  with  its  nursery  puppets; 
and  the  discolorations  and  indentations  which 
age  had  imprinted  on  her  countenance,  with  the 
sparse  and  lifeless  locks  that  here  and  there 
clung  in  patches  to  a  head  of  unfeminine  bald 
ness,  gave  her  exactly  the  air  of  one  of  these 
hapless  victims. 

Neighbor  Northup  was  cast  in  a  sterner  mould, 
and  her  ugliness  was  of  a  more  picturesque 
character.  The  strength  of  her  gray  eye,  hawk 
nose,  firm-set  mouth  and  square  jaw  remained 
unimpaired  by  the  ravages  of  years.  Her  face 
was  of  one  uniform  tint  of  gypsy  brown,  and  her 
iron-gray  hair,  combed  straight  back,  was  tightly 
fastened  in  a  frankly  minute  knot.  Her  gown 
of  dark-blue  calico  suited  well  with  the  Zincali 
associations  of  her  lean,  erect  figure,  and  self- 
reliant  air. 

Harty,  Neighbor  Northup's  granddaughter, 
stood  at  the  ironing-table,  her  fresh  young 


AN  AFTERNOON  AT  NEIGHBOR  NORTHUP  S.      75 

features  delicately  flushed,  as  the  light  dews  of 
labor  just  moistened  her  healthy  white  forehead, 
disturbing  with  tiny  tangles  the  neatly-smoothed 
waves  of  rich  brown  hair.  Harty  sang  at  her 
work  with  all  the  clan  of  the  song-sparrow,  re 
peating  again  and  again  the  same  ballad  strain  of 
"  Mary  of  the  Wild  Moor."  Sweet-brier  petals, 
borne  on  the  light  breeze,  fluttered  through  the 
little  window  and  drifted  among  the  coarse  white 
folds  of  the  thin-worn  old  linen  sheets  spun  by 
her  great-grandmother,  as  Harty,  in  her  clear, 
fresh  tones,  sang  the  dreary  refrain,  — 

"  Oh  !  't  was  there  Mary  perished  and  died, 
From  the  winds  that  blew  'cross  the  wild  moor  !  " 

No  feeling  for  the  contrast  between  wintry 
moor  and  sunny  meadow,  between  the  child  of 
home  and  the  daughter  of  shame,  no  sense  of 
the  rude  passion  and  pathos  of  the  song  stirred 
in  the  sheltered  nature  of  the  girl  and  moved 
her  to  dwell  thus  upon  its  recital  of  the  never- 
ending  story  of  desertion,  want,  suffering,  and 
death.  Happily  too  young  in  thought  and  ex 
perience  to  be  reached  by  any  echoes  from  the 
depths  of  life,  the  words  were  of  no  particular 
moment  to  her,  but  the  tune  was  a  pretty  tune, 
like  any  other.  In  the  unconscious  charm  of 
her  untouched  simplicity,  she  was  the  Yankee 
counterpart  of  that  English  peasant  maid  of 
whom  the  peasant  lover  exclaims :  — 


76  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"  How  gently  rock  yon  poplars  high 
Against  the  reach  of  primrose  sky, 

With  heaven's  pale  candles  stored  ! 
She  sees  them  all,  sweet  Lettice  White ! 
I  '11  ev'n  go  sit  again  to-night 

Beside  her  ironing-board !  " 

But,  though  Harty  may  be  a  living  poem,  she 
is  destined  never  to  know  it;  and  the  story  of 
her  life  and  its  surroundings  is  to  be  written  by 
fate  in  such  plain  prose  as  belongs  to  this  nar 
rative  of  one  afternoon  of  home-life  at  Neighbor 
Northup's. 

"  Harty  's  ez  chipper  ez  a  conqueedle,"  com 
mented  Widow  Bill  B.,  "  and  thet's  a  real  harn- 
sum  toon  she  's  a-singin'." 

"  Hum-ha,"  debated  Neighbor  Northup,  who 
was  of  a  firmer  mind  than  ever  to  give  assent 
to  anything;  "Harty  favors  me  in  her  v'ice; 
old  Prisbyter'an  Priest  Brown  uster  say  my 
v'ice  was  powerful  strong.  Reck'lect,  Betsey, 
up  to  Elder  Burdickses  woods'  meetin',  to  the 
Dark  Corners,  the'  was  a  hime  chune  't  we  sung 
b1  spells.  I  don'  know  's  I  could  justly  turn  it 
now,"  mused  the  dame,  with  an  unwonted  access 
of  modesty,  which  was  presently  quite  justified 
by  her  execution  of— 

"  O  sisters,  I  want  you,  — 
I  want  you,  and  I  want  you, 
To  wear  the  glit'rin'  crown." 

"I  always  liked  the  'Good  Old  Way'  my 
self;  it  lined  off  real  handy,"  suggested  her 


AN   AFTERNOON  AT  NEIGHBOR  NORTHUP'S.     77 

crony,  sending  off  the  dame  upon  the  strains 

of,- 

"  Ez  I  went  down  'n  the  valley  to  pray, 
A-studyin'  about  this  good  old  way, 
Ez  I  went  down  in  the  valley  to  pray  —  " 

"  Merciful  George !  "  suddenly  ejaculated  the 
self-interrupted  singer,  regarding  with  lowering 
looks  an  advancing  group  of  figures ;  and  "  Mer- 
ci-ful  George  !  "  she  repeated  with  deepening  dis 
gust,  "  ef  thiar  ain't  my  darter  Skinner  an'  her 
ran-dan  o'  young  'uns,  come  ter  spend  the  arter- 
noon,  sure  ez  pizen." 

"  Deary  me,  neighbor,"  echoed  the  pliant 
Widow,  "  deary  me,  comfort  is  all  to  an  eend  !  " 

Neighbor  Northup  was  by  no  means  the 
doting  grandam  of  conventional  narrative. 
She  cherished  no  weak  fondness  for  her  de 
scendants,  and  as  often  as  she  heard  of  any 
death  among  children  was  wont  to  express  no 
slight  disgust  in  that  it  had  not  been  that  of 
one  of  her  grandchildren.  This  arraignment 
of  fate  was  not  prompted  by  any  personal  anti 
pathy  to  her  young  relatives,  but  by  the  hard 
common-sense  of  the  matter,  as  she  viewed  it,  — 
"Skinner  being  sich  a  poor  coot,  and  him  and 
her  with  more  children  than  they  justly  knowed 
what  to  do  with." 

"  Lovisy  Ann  Skinner  !  "  was  the  stern  saluta 
tion  addressed  by  Neighbor  Northup  to  her  un 
looked-for  guests ;  "  of  all  possessed !  What 


78  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

brung  ye  here,  with  all  them  tribes  o'  Beelze 
bub?  Did  ye  ride  or  travel?" 

"  Me  an'  the  childun,  we  travelled  a  con- 
sider'ble  spell,"  drawled  the  impassive  and 
apathetic  Lovisy,  dropping  into  a  splint-bot 
tomed  chair  and  fanning  her  stout  person  with 
the  almanac ;  "  but  to  the  last  on  it,  Cap'n  Sail- 
forth,  he  come  along  in  his  lumber-wagon,  'n' 
we  rid  with  him  'beout  tew  mild." 

"  Abner  Sailforth,  hey?"  wrathfully  returned 
her  mother.  "  I  wish 't  he  was  in  Flanders. 
Hain't  he  got  nothin'  to  do  but  go  cartin'  of  you 
round  ?  Must  'ha  ben  wuss  off  'n  common." 

"  Well,  he  was  kind  of  oh-be-joyful,"  admitted 
Lovisy. 

"  Cap'n  Sailforth,  he  's  got  a  jug  in  his  wagon," 
innocently  piped  up  the  youthful  Jonas  Skinner, 
and  immediately  fled,  howling  under  the  sting 
of  a  smart  slap  inflicted  by  the  red  right  arm  of 
his  grandmother,  with  a  long  brown  towel  which 
hung  at  hand,  while  the  grandmaternal  accents 
bade  him  "  quit  scandalizing  [that  is,  slandering] 
of  his  neighbors  and  betters." 

"  Don't  ye  tech  them  curr'ns  dcown  to  the 
garding !  "  shouted  the  dame  after  the  boys,  as 
they  disappeared  with  suspicious  alacrity  in  that 
direction ;  "  ef  ye  do,  I  tell  ye  now,  I  '11  make  ye 
feel  cur'ous !  " 

Quiet  being  now  restored,  the  Widow  made 
some  deprecatory  inquiries  after  the  health  of 


AN   AFTERNOON   AT   NEIGHBOR   NORTHUP'S.      79 

Lovisy  and  the  absent  Skinner,  while  her  in 
dulgent  parent  smoked  in  contemptuous  silence, 
as  the  long-drawn  recital  of  the  physical  woes 
of  the  pair  welled  forth  from  Mrs.  Skinner's 
voluble  lips.  Mr.  Skinner,  it  seemed,  was  suf 
fering  from  a  cold,  and  "  though  he  clapped  to 
and  took  everything  he  could  think  on  (he  was 
always  a  Bettyin'  'round  in  the  cluset)  he  wa'n't 
no  better,  an'  she  misdoubted  he  would  n't  be 
'round  very  spry  by  hayin'  time.  He  mought, 
an*  then  agin  he  mought  n't,  but  things  looked 
dubersome."  She  herself  languished  under  an 
ailment  the  symptoms  of  which  were  not  of  a 
character  to  inspire  much  sympathy  when  made 
the  subject  of  complaint  in  July  weather,  and 
were  described  as  the  state  of  being  "  all  of  a 
trimble,  with  cold  chills  running  up  and  down 
the  spine  of  her  back."  As  for  the  maladies  and 
misfortunes  of  the  children,  they  were  related 
with  a  wealth  of  detail  that  seemed  as  endless 
as  the  blocks  of  the  Job's  Trouble  patchwork- 
quilt  with  which  her  fat  fingers  (armed  with  a 
brass,  open-topped  thimble)  were  appropriately 
busied. 

The  talk  next  turned  upon  the  neighbor 
hood  news,  being  the  unprecedented  luck  of 
one  Tad  Hooper,  who  was  currently  reported 
to  have  discovered  a  gold  mine  on  his  farm. 
"  Skinner,  he  said,"  related  Lovisy,  not  unwil 
ling  to  find  herself  the  enthralling  narrator  of 


80  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

the  hour,  "  he  said  how  Hiram  Collins  should 
say  thet  Tad  Hooper  told  him  hisself  thet  he 
see  it  croppin'  outer  them  rocks,  chunk  artcr 
'chunk !  " 

"  Why,  Aunt  Lovisy,"  interrupted  Harty,  who 
was  listening  with  an  interest  that  worked  no 
little  detriment  to  her  ironing,  "  I  thought  Tad 
Hooper  did  n't  know  nothin'  !  " 

"  Toby  sure,  thet's  the  way  on 't,  child," 
eagerly  assented  the  Widow,  in  full  enjoyment 
of  the  marvel,  " '  the  wheel  o'  fortin  dooz  for  to 
go  round,'  ez  the  childern's  father  uster  say,  an' 
'  ef  ye  have  luck,  little  wit  '11  do,'  says  the  chil 
dern's  father,  says  he.  'T  is  so,  ain't  it,  neigh 
bor?"  she  pursued,  deferentially  appealing  to 
her  stern  hostess  for  corroboration  of  the  phil 
osophical  moralizings  of  the  late  Mr.  Bill  B. 

"  Humph,"  shortly  returned  that  lady,  with  a 
vigorous  puff  at  her  pipe,  while  her  subservient 
auditory  waited  humbly  upon  her  words,  "  I  dis- 
remember  what  Northup  moughter  hed  ter  say 
'beout  it,"  she  began,  with  the  ironic  chuckle  of 
one  who  was  above  the  weakness  of  quoting  any 
marital  dictum,  "  but  I  c'n  tell  ye  what's  ez  sure 
ez  jedgment,  an'  thet  is  thet  the"  ain't  no  gold 
on  Tad  Hooper's  farm,  nor  never  will  be,  'ccpt 
fool's  gold ;  an'  thet 's  the  long  an'  short  on  't." 

This  debatable  utterance  of  the  oracle  was 
received  in  a  respectful  silence  only  broken  by 
the  return  of  the  brothers,  who  had  fallen  out 


AN  AFTERNOON  AT  NEIGHBOR  NORTHUP'S.   8 1 

by  the  way,  and  who  hastened  to  pour  into  the 
maternal  ear  an  exhaustive  narrative  of  the 
manner  in  which  Henry  Clay  and  Thomas  Dorr 
had  come  to  blows,  the  results  of  which  politi 
cal  conflict  were  apparent  in  torn  jackets  and 
tear-smeared  faces. 

"  Lovisy,  be  ye  goin'  ter  let  them  childern  ride 
over  y'r  head?"  vociferated  the  dame,  rising  to 
her  feet.  "  You  Tom  Dorr,  hush  now,  or  I  '11 
shet  ye  up  f'r  the  rest  o'  y'r  nat'ral  life.  Y'r 
ma  'n'  Widder  Bill  B.,  they  can't  hear  theirselves 
think." 

"  Never  mind,  gran'mother,"  coaxed  Harty> 
who  had  finished  her  ironing,  "  I  '11  git  Pesky 
Phillups's  old  boat,  'n'  go  up  the  pond,  'n'  the 
boys  c'n  go,  too." 

"  Goody  !  Goody  !  "  roared  her  interesting 
companions,  and  "  Joy  go  with  ye  !  "  sarcasti 
cally  shouted  the  grandam,  as  they  disappeared 
with  their  cousin,  —  the  girls  of  the  party  being 
detained  by  her  orders. 

"  Hain't  ye  got  no  stent  for  them  great  gals, 
Lovisy?"  she  queried  severely.  "But  mebbe 
they  was  all  on  'em  borned  with  silver  spoons 
inter  their  mouths." 

"  Le  's  try  'em  in  their  book-larnin,'  neigh 
bor,"  pleaded  the  peace-loving  Widow;  and  the 
Old  Farmers'  Almanac  being  laid  before  Miry, 
aged  eleven,  with  an  encouraging  injunction  to 
do  her  possibles,  she  managed,  after  sundry 
6 


82  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

admonitions  from  her  grandmother  not  to  read 
so  like  a  mouse  in  the  cheese,  to  convey  to  the 
company  the  following  piece  of  wisdom :  — 

"  Farm-ers  att-end  This-is-the-time-of-good 
h-u-s  hush,  —  no,  suthin'  else,  —  hus-hus-ban-dry 
f'r  plantin'  y'r  mangle-mangles  ["  mangle  wuz- 
zles,  I  expect,  dear,"  whispered  the  kindly  old 
woman,  but  the  wretched  Miry  justified  her 
name  by  plunging  deeper  in]  mangles  worsteds 
—  no,  't  ain't  that  —  f  r  plantin'  y'r  mangled 
weasels." 

"  Shet  up  thet  there  book !  "  came  in  hollow 
tones  of  disgust  from  the  grandmother;  and  the 
Widow  hastily  complied,  but  beckoned  to  her 
side  the  little  Medora,  to  hear  her  con  her 
alphabet,  and  attempted  to  start  her  aright  by 
repeating  with  nodding  suggestiveness,  "  A  bus 
tle  A,  B  bustle  B,  C  bustle  C  —  "  "  What 's 
them  'ere?"  lisped  the  bewildered  babe;  and 
Lovisy,  with  explosions  of  laughter,  informed 
the  Widow  that  the  teacher  "  did  n't  learn  them 
that  way  any  more." 

"  Dearest  heart !  "  ejaculated  the  flustered 
Widow,  "  no,  I  b'lieve  they  don't,  come  to  think ; 
but  seems  so  it  don't  come  nat'ral  to  say  'em  no 
other  way.  Myrandy's  childern,  they  hollered, 
when  I  told  'em  ter  say  '  Quf  bustle  quf.'  '  No, 
gran'ma,  't  ain't  Quf,  it 's  Q! '  —  but  law  !  I  did  n't 
charge  my  mind  'ith  it." 

The  Widow's  early  instructions  had  evidently 


AN  AFTERNOON  AT  NEIGHBOR  NORTHUP'S.      83 

been  imparted  at  one  of  those  dame  schools 
where,  for  lack  of  books,  the  alphabet  was  re 
cited  to  the  children,  and  hummed  over  by 
them,  in  the  form  of  "  A  by  itself,  A,"  etc.,  with 
the  inevitable  phonetic  rendering. 

But  what  succeeded  in  the  Iliad  of  Neighbor 
Northup's  woes?  Came  the  return  of  Harty 
and  the  boys,  flushed  and  jubilant;  followed 
the  four  o'clock  supper,  laid  a  trifle  earlier  than 
usual,  with  prudent  forethought  for  the  timely 
exodus  of  Lovisy  and  her  tribe,  in  order  to 
reach  their  own  domicile  by  "  airly  candlelight." 
Sing,  O  Muse,  of" them  porridge  "  (always  known, 
in  Narragansett,  by  this  honorable  plural),  of 
johnny-cake  and  cold  boiled  pork,  of  rye  an' 
Injun  bread,  of  flour  cake,  of  cold  vegetables 
left  from  dinner,  and,  for  the  children,  thought 
fully  interspersed  with  tender  shredded  bits  of 
pork-rind.  Sing,  O  heavenly  goddess,  the 
wrath  of  Neighbor  Northup  when  this  delicacy 
was  declined  by  the  youthful  Valerius  (named 
from  an  imperfect  recollection  of  Bunyan's  im 
mortal  tale),  as  he  forcibly  rejected  the  offending 
morsel  with  an  explosive  commentary  of,  "  I 
don't  like  it,  ma;  I  don't,  I  don't!  " 

"  Uhdone !  "  shouted  the  grandam,  in  the 
colonial  corruption  of  the  imperative  "  Ha' 
done,  sir,"  of  English  comedy.  "  Uhdone,  I 
say,  'n'  don't  you  darst  open  y'r  head  agin,  'cept 
ter  put  y'r  vittles  into  't,  or  I  '11  rise  upon  ye !  " 


84  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

—  the  last  clause  enunciated  in  fearful  accents. 
Meanwhile  Charlotte  Ludovica,  a  scrawny,  sal 
low  damsel  of  ten,  was  furtively  partaking  of 
her  fourth  cup  of  scalding  hot  tea,  precociously 
taken  without  "  trimmings ;  "  for  her  mother 
approvingly  said  of  Luddy  Lotty,  as  she  was 
commonly  called,  that  she  had  n't  a  sweet  tooth 
in  her  head. 

Calmer  moments  followed,  while  Lovisy  strove 
for  a  diversion  by  plaintively  inquiring  of  Harty 
"  ef  she  wa'n't  most  beat  out  with  rowin'."  "  She 
ain't  rowed  none !  "  chorused  the  young  bar 
barians.  "  Joe  Phillups  come  right  out  arter 
her,  'n'  went  with  us,  'n'  he  would  n't  let  us  row 
none,  nuther." 

"  Jest  wanted  ter  show  off,"  grumbled  Henry 
Clay,  with  precocious  discernment. 

"  Yes,"  agreed  the  equally  aggrieved  Thomas 
Dorr,  "  an'  him  an'  Harty  kep'  up  sich  an  ever- 
lastin"  jabberin'  't  they  skeered  the  turkles  off 
when  we  was  clus'  up  to  the  rock,  'n'  we  did  n't 
ketch  none." 

"  Oho,"  exclaimed  Grandmother  Northup, 
but  this  time  with  simulated  wrath,  while  Harty 
flushed  a  painful  red,  "  hes  thet  fool  feller  ben 
pokin'  'round  agin?  Harty,  I  sh'd  thought 
you  'd  a  killed  him  or  cured  him,  this  time." 

Lovisy  here  observed,  with  that  superior  and 
patronizing  air  of  calm  judgment  which  one 
woman  never  fails  to  show  respecting  the  tender 


AN  AFTERNOON   AT  NEIGHBOR   NORTHUP'S.      85 

history  of  another,  that  she  "s'posed  Harty 
knowed  her  own  business,  but  f'r  her  part  she 
should  n't  wanter  live  with  his  folks,  for  old 
Marm  Phillups  was  deef 's  a  beetle,  'n'  Pesky  was 
cracked  by  spells." 

"  Don't  you  fret  y'r  skull,  Lovisy,"  elegantly 
admonished  the  triumphant  grandmother. 
"  Guess  Harty  '11  do  ez  well,  when  her  time 
comes,  ez  any  of  her  folks  hes  done  afore 
her !  " 

The  dame's  high  good  humor  mounted  to  the 
point  of  presenting  to  Lovisy,  as  she  bestirred 
herself  after  supper  with  preparations  for  de 
parture,  a  relic  from  her  wardrobe,  to  be  made 
over-for  use  in  her  young  family. 

"  It 's  a  clever  gownd  yit,  Lovisy,"  said  the 
grandmother,  smoothing  it  approvingly,  "  but, 
good  land  o'  patience !  your  Sarah  'Liza  'd 
thrash  it  out  'tween  Cubit's  Hill  an'  Potter's 
Pond.  Ef  thet  there  was  my  gal,  I  'd  keep  her 
sewed  up  'n  tow-cloth." 

Provided  with  this  benefaction  and  with  sun 
dry  other  spoils,  Lovisy  and  her  train  departed 
to  rejoin  the  twins,  who  had  been  left  at  home 
in  charge  of  the  six-months-old  baby,  his  mother 
placidly  remarking  that  "  she  guessed  Moses  'n' 
Aaron  'd  pretty  much  giv'  him  up  by  now." 
Harty  took  some  hasty  but  indispensable  stitches 
in  the  garments  of  the  over-energetic  Jonas,  while 
the  Widow  Bill  B.  snatched  a  furtive  kiss  from 


86  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

the  chubby  Medora.  The  boys  dashed  off  as 
though  set  free  from  school,  —  "  Poley,"  who, 
deriving  his  name  from  the  tyrant  Corsican,  was 
naturally  the  moving  spirit  in  savagery  among 
them,  secretly  gloating  over  the  consciousness 
that  his  grandmother's  useful  tabby  at  that  mo 
ment  lay  nursing  a  lame  paw  in  the  potato  patch, 
whither  she  had  been  driven  by  the  mischievous 
stone  that  dealt  the  wound,  and,  with  some 
uneasy  apprehensions  of  judgment  yet  to  light 
upon  her  persecutor,  bursting  defiantly  into  a 
catch  of  folk-song  that  had  been  handed  down 
in  the  race  of  Skinners,  — 

"  Oh  dear  !  oh  dear  !  what  shell  I  do 

I  've  killed  my  daddy's  keow; 
I  won't  tell  him  on  it  ter-day, 
But  I  '11  tell  him  ter-morr^a/,  —  " 

while  Neighbor  Northup,  not  as  yet  fully  aware 
of  the  various  ravages  committed  on  her  ter 
ritory  by  these  invaders,  and  placated  by  the 
removal  of  a  serious  cause  of  irritation,  uncon 
sciously  returned  an  antistrophe  to  their  parting 
song,  as  she  gave  a  long  puff  of  relief  at  her 
after-supper  pipe,  and  thoughtfully  struck  up 
the  refrain,  — 

"Believin',  we  rej'ice 
Ter  see  the  curse  removed." 


FROM  HOUR  TO  HOUR  IN  THE  COUNTRY 
STORE. 

THE  country  store  might  not  be  a  gem,  but 
it  was  richly  set,  in  a  background  of  dark 
ly-wooded  hills  steeply  descending  to  the  stream 
beside  which  it  stood.  Thus  secluded  in  its 
surroundings  of  woodland  loveliness,  its  visible 
relations  to  the  world  of  trade  were  so  few  that 
at  the  vacant  hours  when  the  mail-carrier  was 
not  due,  and  no  boat  lay  at  the  rude  landing,  it 
might  almost  have  posed  to  the  wandering  artist 
as  the  storm-beaten,  moss-grown  cabin  of  an 
aged  settler  in  the  primitive  Narragansett  wil 
derness.  But  it  dated  from  the  Revolutionary 
period,  and,  as  was  then  customary  in  the  South 
County,  it  formed  an  integral  part  of  a  large, 
gambrel-roofed,  shingle-sided,  wood-colored 
farmhouse,  —  being  attached  at  one  end  of  that 
structure,  with  its  independent  entrance  from  the 
road  sometimes  closed  by  a  half-door,  and  its 
door  of  communication  with  the  domestic  apart 
ments  always  conveniently  ajar.  This  rather 
torpid  nerve-centre  of  the  sluggish  life  of  the 
outlying  farms  possessed  vital  attractions  for  the 


88  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

customers  of  the  past  generation,  who  arrived  at 
their  goal  by  ox-teams,  or,  in  eccentric  instances, 
by  driving  that  cautious  and  conservative  steed 
in  harness,  or  else  riding  him  after  the  fashion 
of  "  old  Shawmut's  pioneer,"  the  hermit  Black- 
stone.  But  such  as  did  not  drive  the  patient 
oxen  under  their  names  of  old-country  descent, 
as  "  Duke  and  Darby,"  "  Buck  and  Bright,"  or, 
in  the  later  nomenclature  of  patriotic  indepen 
dence,  "  Star  and  Stripe,"  and  such  as  did  not 
urge  the  reluctant  Dobbin  in  the  creaking  cart 
or  the  slow-jogging  wagon,  came  by  the  water 
ways  which  lent  a  grace  to  rustic  travel ;  or  else, 
in  their  own  phrase,  "  footed  it"  on  the  drift 
ways,  or  over  the  hard-beaten  little  paths  that 
led  across-lots.  So,  by  the  winding  ways  of  old 
lanes  that  nourished  tall  blossoming  weeds  in 
summer,  and  when  "  the  frost  was  coming  out  of 
the  ground,"  were  ironically  described  by  indig 
nant  women-folk  as  being  "  in  full  bloom  "  with 
a  luxuriant  depth  of  mud ;  by  the  old  roads  of 
scarce  higher  degree,  guarded  in  sub-baronial 
fashion  by  a  gate  at  every  farm,  and  keeping 
the  same  leisurely  twists  and  turns  that  were 
imposed  to  suit  the  convenience  of  the  colonial 
proprietors;  by  the  dark  waters  of  the  haunted 
Hawkho  Pond;  by  the  loops  and  curves  of  Pond 
Lily  Brook  or  Indian  Run,  —  they  all  met  at  the 
same  point,  in  search  of  their  household  supplies, 
and  to  call  for  the  weekly  newspaper,  the  "  New- 


IN  THE   COUNTRY   STORE.  89 

port  Marcury  "  or  the  denominational  journal, 
with  the  infrequent  letter  from  the  daughter  who 
was  learning  a  trade,  or  the  son  who  was  "  stor 
ing  it "  in  some  New  England  town.  It  was  the 
neighborly  duty  of  the  storekeeping  postmaster, 
or  of  the  droppers-in  at  the  store,  to  make  known 
the  arrival  of  letters ;  and  the  "  pleas  forrard  " 
generally  scrawled  in  the  corner  of  one  of  these 
missives  was  literally  obeyed.  The  addresses 
were  almost  uniformly  in  masculine  hands,  —  it 
being  the  received  tradition  among  the  women 
folk  that  a  presumably  gossiping  feminine  epis 
tle  would  be  officially  slighted,  if  not  utterly  cast 
aside,  to  make  way  for  the  business  communica 
tions  of  the  serious  sex.  Occasionally  a  rustic 
postmaster  failed  to  comply  with  all  the  unwrit 
ten  regulations  of  neighborhood  law,  but  right 
eous  wrath  overtook  him. 

"  I  never  see  no  sech  do-little  coot  ez  thet 
Jim  Fones,"  was  the  angry  comment  of  Uncle 
B'riah  Sanford,  as  on  his  way  home  from  the 
store  he  accosted  a  neighbor,  who  heard  his 
story  with  equal  indignation.  "  He  ain't  what 
I  call  very  work-brittle.  Look-a-here,  now,  I 
jest  got  this  here  letter  my  darter  Marcy  's  writ 
me,  an'  it's  ben  a-layin'  over  thiar  nigh  upon 
three  weeks.  I  dono  where  his  wits  was,"  pur 
sued  Uncle  B'riah,  with  a  bitter  smile  of  scorn 
for  the  sterility  of  the  official  mind,  "never  to 
tho't  on  Dely  Helums,  thet  mustee  gal.  She 


9O  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

goes  by  the  store  mos'  gin'ally  when  she  goes 
up  't  the  big  house  chorin*  of  a  Sa'a'd'y.  He 
mighter  ben  on  the  lookout  for  her,  an'  'a'  sent  it 
to  me,  well 's  not.  Wai,  I  guess  ef  Gov'ment 
was  knowin'  to  't  we  sh'd  see  a  change,  right 
short  off." 

The  interior  of  the  store,  as  seen  on  a  mild 
and  hazy  afternoon  of  mid-autumn,  presented 
its  usual  display  of  "  infinite  riches  in,  a  little 
room,"  so  far  as  a  teeming  variety  answers  to 
the  idea  of  riches.  The  needs  of  man  and 
beast,  as  felt  at  the  So  and  So  Corners,  could 
be  amply  satisfied  here,  so  that  it  was  com 
monly  remarked  that  Elder  Nahum  Holley,  the 
begging  friar  of  the  Baptist  persuasion,  whose 
itineracy  the  good  people  of  the  countryside 
had  tolerated  for  a  generation,  used  to  sing 
with  peculiar  fervor  when  lodged  at  the  store, 
and  after  partaking  of  a  refreshment  flatteringly 
described  by  him  as  "  a  very  promiscuous  |>ud- 
din',"  an  original  hymn,  of  which  the  rather 
singular  refrain  was :  — 

"All  my  critter  wants  employed, 
All  my  hours  of  rest  alloyed, 
All  my  needs  air  well  supployed." 

The  gifts  of  the  season,  in  fruits  and  vege 
tables  of  the  homelier  sorts,  occasionally  found/ 
a  place  here,  —  not  for  sale,  of  course,  for  who 
would  be  so  absurd  as  to  buy  "  green  sass,"  of 
which  everybody  could  raise  enough  and  to 


IN   THE   COUNTRY   STORE.  9! 

spare?  —  but  as  signs  of  the  skill  of  their  pro 
ducers.  It  was  a  spontaneous  exhibition  of  the 
works  of  nature,  an  inchoate  rural  fair.  Behind 
the  bar,  as  it  had  been  in  the  old  times  when 
strong  waters  were  dispensed  to  all  comers, 
from  the  Tory  Squire  to  Injun  Moll,  that  ineffi 
cient  factotum,  the  blameworthy  Jim,  was  shell 
ing  some  beans,  rather  disparagingly  described 
by  him  a$  comprising  "  all  nations,"  but  chiefly 
of  the  "  hundud  to  one  "  variety.  A  woman  and 
a  little  girl  just  entering  the  store  became  the 
objects  of  a  leisurely  observation  on  the  part  of 
the  usual  knot  of  loungers,  which,  in  its  undis 
guised  air  of  languid  routine  scrutiny,  could 
hardly  be  surpassed  by  the  spent  nonchalance 
of  the  watering-place  stare. 

"  Mis'  Tift,"  as  she  was  presently  addressed, 
was  a  stout,  hearty  woman,  of  whose  age  the 
less  said  the  better,  but  who  might  have  been 
any^iere  from  the  middle  regions  of  the  forties 
to  that  abrupt  descent  of  life  which  is  oddly 
described  as  "  risin'  fifty."  This  exemplary 
matron  was  evidently  of  my  Lord  Bacon's  opin 
ion  that  "  Virtue  is  like  a  rich  stone,  best  plain 
set ;  "  for  her  dress  was  marked  by  severity  of 
choice,  and  comprised  a  massive  pair  of  rough 
Itather  shoes,  fashioned  by  a  veteran  cobbler 
who  still  plied  his  trade  from  house  to  house,  a 
calico  short-gown  and  petticoat,  with  a  long 
apron,  and  a  log-cabin  sttnbonnet.  She  had 


92  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

coarse,  harsh  hair,  styled  "  molasses  color  "  by 
herself,  and  springing  from  the  top  of  the  fore 
head  in  that  point  which  is  esteemed  a  mark  of 
beauty,  and  of  which  one  of  the  ladies  of  the 
Stuart  period  makes  a  charmingly  complacent 
mention  in  her  memoirs,  when  enumerating  her 
attractions.  But,  treated  as  it  is  on  rustic  faces, 
the  effect  is  as  decidedly  ugly  as  is  the  meeting 
of  a  pair  of  black  eyebrows  (which  the  Romans, 
with  characteristically  bad  taste,  nevertheless 
admired) ;  and  hence,  perhaps,  the  invective 
with  which  it  is  loaded  in  the  vigorous  bucolic 
speech,  —  being  known  as  "scold's  peak,"  and 
yet  more  derisively,  as  "  a  cowlick." 

The  child  of  ten  who  accompanied  her  was  a 
victim  to  the  high-low  cut  of  the  dress  of  chil 
dren  at  that  day,  by  which  the  shoulders  of 
little  girls  were  neither  set  free  nor  quite  re 
strained,  so  that  restless  childhood  was  continually 
thrusting  up  one  shoulder  or  the  other  in  the 
revolt  from  the  uneasy  bounds  which  fretted 
but  did  not  confine.  Her  tow-colored  locks, 
kept  neither  long  nor  short,  were  all  gathered 
in  one  "wisp,"  and  tied  with  a  bit  of  faded 
ribbon,  supplemented  with  a  colored  shoestring. 
She  was  of  an  ill-nourished  aspect,  and  bore  the 
large-eyed  look  of  illness ;  or,  as  her  mother 
more  graphically  said,  "  she  was  as  poor  as  a 
crow,  and  her  eyes  were  as  big  as  saucers." 

A    faded,   fussy,   nervous   little   woman,   who 


IN  THE   COUNTRY   STORE.  93 

had  come  in  with  a  deprecating  air,  after  fidget 
ing  about  for  a  few  minutes,  approached  Mis' 
Tift,  who  was  volubly  beating  down  the  store 
keeper  in  his  tariff  of  West  India  goods,  and 
addressed  her  with  an  apologetic  'hem,  yet  with 
something  of  the  modest  assurance  of  one  who 
knew  the  proper  forms  of  polite  inquiry. 

"  I  wanter  know,  ef  't  ain't  imperdent  in  me 
ter  ahsk,  ef  this  here  ain't  Salome  Stillman  thet 
was?" 

"  Well,  I  calc'late  't  ain't  nobody  but  the  old 
woman  herself,"  graciously  replied  the  owner  of 
this  complex  individuality,  "  but,  my  stars  V 
garters,  woman,  who  in  time  be  you?" 

"Why,  Mis'  Tift,  don't  you  reck'lect  Mis' 
Crandall,  Samwell  Crandall's  wife,  she  thet  was 
a  Rose?"  queried  Jim  Fones,  perceiving  that 
the  office  of  master  of  ceremonies  devolved 
upon  him. 

"  F'r  the  land's  sake  alive !  "  exclaimed  Mis' 
Tift,  as  she  rigidly  scrutinized  the  faded  and 
withered  features  of  her  that  was  once  a  Rose. 
"  Why,  Nabby,  heow  you  'm  broke  !  You  'm 
growed  gray,  an'  you  'm  wrinkled  some,  an' 
you  'm  bent  over,  an'  y'r  teeth  's  most  all  gone, 
ain't  they.  Lor',  I  should  n't  ha'  knowed  ye 
from  Adam." 

"Well,  I  expect  I  be  changed  some,"  re 
turned  the  meek  Mis'  Crandall,  evidently  with 
some  slight  twinge  of  the  pain  known  to  even 


94  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

the  most  homespun  woman  on  becoming  a  prey 
to  the  attacks  of  ruthless  time,  "  but  I  sh'd  'a' 
knowed  you  agin,  S'lome,  ef  I  'd  'a'  met  ye  in  a 
porridge-dish.  And  heow  's  y'r  heaalth,  nowa 
days?" 

"  Tol-lol,  on'y  jest  tol-lol ;  jest  so  's  ter  be 
abeout,"  continued  Mis'  lift,  with  increasing  lu- 
gubriousness. 

"And  heow's  little  sissy?"  pursued  the  sed 
ulous  inquirer. 

"  Well,  'Mandy,  she  ain't  a  bit  well.  I  ben 
mithered  more  'n  little  ter  know  what  ter  do  with 
her.  Looks  dretful  poor  in  the  face,  don't  she? 
['Mandy  falls  into  a  state  of  wriggling  self-con 
sciousness.]  'Pears  ter  me  she's  kinder  consump 
tive.  (Take  y'r  shoulder  in, 'Mandy,  that  ain't 
pretty.)  I  ben  doct'rin  her,  back  along,  with 
some  o '  these  boughten  pills,  but  they  come 
oration  high, —  thutty-fife  Cents  f'r  the  big  box, 
—  so  't  I  gin  'em  up,  an'  I  Ve  kep'  her  on  yarb 
tea  now,  stiddy.  (Don't  witch  with  thet  draft 
terthet  stove,  'Mandy;  you'll  git  it  out  o'  kilter, 
fuzzino.)  Black  daisy  tea 's  real  good  f'r  them 
distressed  spells  like  she  hes ;  it 's  both  liv'nin' 
and  stringth'nin',  ez  ole  Aunt  Rooty  uster  say. 
Well,  an'  howsumever  come  you  deown  here 
ter-day,  Mis'  Crandall,  clear  way  deown  from 
the  Ville?" 

"  Well,  the  way  on  't  was,  their  father,  he  took 
a  notion  to  a  pair  o'  steers  somewher's  down  on 


IN  THE   COUNTRY   STORE.  95 

Pine  Judy  Pint,  an'  he 's  gonter  study  on  'em 
awhile,  an'  lef  me  here  ter  do  some  tradin'. 
Well,  I  expect  I  hed  oughter  be  tendin'  toe  it." 

"  Well,  good-day,  Mis'  Crandall.  I  dono  's  I 
shall  ever  git  up  thet  far  to  where  you  live.  I 
don't  git  no  time  f'r  visitin'  'n'  sech." 

"I'm  afeerd,  Mis'  Tift,  you 'm  too  smart  ter 
gin  yerself  no  chance,  but  you  oughter  take  a 
time  'n'  come'n'  see  us." 

"  Well,  ef  I  be  any  smarter  than  the  next  one 
its  force  put,  thet 's  all.  My  will 's  good  ter  be 
lazy,  jest  the  same  's  ary  one  on  'em.  Lor',  I 
sh'd  like  ter  lay  abed  ev'ry  mawnin  o'  my  life 
tell  five  o'clock,  ef  so  be  't  I  could.  But  I  sh'll 
come  up,  ef  I  ken  's  well 's  not." 

"  So  do.  An'  ef  ever  I  go  pahst  y'r  house  I 
sh'll  'light  'n'  see  your  folks." 

"We  shell  be  very  pleased  ter  see  ye,  any 
time,"  rather  curtly  replied  the  business-like  Mis' 
Tift,  closing  the  interchange  of  compliments, 
and  resuming  her  bargaining,  which  she  soon 
completed  with  signal  success. 

"  Ma,  ma,"  bleated  the  eager  'Mandy,  holding 
her  mother  by  her  gown,  "  don't  go  yit.  Say, 
git  me  a  new  frock  off'n  this  here  piece  o'  pink 
muslin-de-laine.  Oh,  I  do  want  a  boughten  frock 
so  dretful  bad  !  " 

"  Yes,  you  'd  like  ter  be  reeled  in  silk,  would  n 't 
ye?  "  returned  the  severe  parent.  "  Now,  don't 
you  w'ine,  'Mandy.  I  wish  't  my  head  would  n't 


96  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

ache  tell  I  git  ye  sech  a  frock ;  so  you  study  on 
thet  a  while." 

Headaches  were  all  but  unknown  to  the  ma 
tron,  save  in  the  uses  of  rhetoric,  but  'Mandy 
was  sufficiently  experienced  in  the  significance 
of  the  phrase  just  launched  at  her  to  resign  her 
self  to  the  inevitable,  as  she  and  her  mother  de 
parted,  soon  followed  by  Mis'  Crandall. 

The  sole  comment  made  in  the  conclave  of 
loungers  upon  this  meeting  was  the  indiscreet 
utterance  of  the  adolescent  Sol  Simms  to  Hi 
Collins,  an  equally  simple  youth. 

"  Ain't  it  queer,  though,"  remarked  the  ob 
servant  Sol,  "  heow  Mis'  Teft  never  will  let  on  ez 
she  's  well 's  common,  when  all  the  time  she  dooz 
look  stout 'n'  rugged  'nough,  'cordin'  ter  my  no 
tion,  t'  eat  puddin'  'ith  a  barnshovel !" 

This  attempt  at  wit  was  coldly  received,  Mis' 
Tift  being  the  wife  of  a  man  of  considerable  rus 
tic  importance ;  and  Sol  made  no  further  effort 
to  shine  in  the  conversation  until  his  return  after 
doing  the  afternoon  chores,  to  join  the  group 
that  gathered  around  the  cylinder  stove,  in  which 
crackled  a  hospitable  fire  of  "  lightwood,"  and 
which  was  raised  above  a  shallow  box  filled  with 
sawdust,  and  much  in  need  of  a  fresh  supply  of  the 
same.  Jim  Fones  had  made  the  usual  sly  prepar 
ation  for  his  evening  guests  by  setting  the  clock 
ahead,  and,  as  custom  required,  they  would  govern 
themselves  in  accordance  with  the  simple  device. 


IN  THE   COUNTRY   STORE.  97 

The  bucolic  types  of  which  this  informal  club 
was  composed  were,  with  few  exceptions,  such 
as  to  develop  in  the  observer  a  vigorous  revolt 
from  the  binding  force  of  the  Miltonic  example 
of  homage  to  the  human  face  divine.  Looking 
upon  some  of  these  heavy  countenances,  with 
nothing  of  adolescence  but  its  crudeness  of  con 
tour,  or  nothing  of  age  but  its  lined  and  seamed 
ugliness,  one  was  fain  to  read  backward  the 
meaning  of  that  inexpressibly  moving  cry  of 
longing  after  visible  human  companionship  ut 
tered  from  the  solitudes  of  rayless  darkness,  and 
to  declare  that  the  poet  was  blind  indeed  to  the 
physical  faults  of  Adam's  lineage,  known  to  him 
in  all  its  imperfections  until  exalted  by  the 
idealizing  touch  born  of  a  hopeless  desire. 

For  instance,  there  was  Sol  Simms.  This 
adolescent  was  the  exact  similitude  of  a  gander. 
Every  ludicrous  point  of  resemblance  was  there, 
—  the  long  craning  neck,  the  insignificant,  close- 
cropped,  whitish  head,  the  round,  reddened  eyes, 
the  protruding  beak,  the  abruptly  retreating 
chin,  —  all  these  marking  him,  no  less  than  his 
long  flapping  arms,  strident  voice,  and  uncouth 
gait,  as  being  at  no  distant  remove  from  those 
clothed  figures  of  animals  which  usually  pass 
for  caricatures,  but  which  might  occasionally 
be  esteemed  genuine  likenesses. 

In  effective  antithesis  to  this  specimen  of  un 
gainly  youth  was  the  spectacle  of  fine  old  age 
7 


98  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

afforded  by  Uncle  Josey  Austin,  a  handsome 
old  man,  with-  clear-cut  features  and  flowing 
white  hair  and  beard.  As  sometimes  happens 
in  such  cases,  Nature  had  forgotten  to  put  as 
large  a  supply  of  brains  behind  that  picturesque 
mask  as  the  fitness  of  things  might  seem  to  re 
quire,  and  hence,  perhaps,  the  familiarity  with 
which  he  was  still  addressed  by  his  nickname, 
and  the  freedom  with  which  children  claimed 
his  society. 

"Why,  whiar 's  my  stick  gone  to?"  mildly 
inquired  Uncle  Josey,  soon  after  taking  his  seat. 
"  I  brung't  in,  sure-ly." 

"  Thiar  't  is,  Uncle,  over  thiar,  right  behind 
ye,"  chorused  the  company. 

"  Ef  't  hed  ben  a  b'ar,  't  would  a  bitten  ye," 
observed  Jim  Fones,  and  the  ready  rustic 
laugh  went  round  at  the  time-honored  bit  of 
pleasantry. 

"  Say,  Uncle  Josey,  Uncle  Josey,  tell  us  the 
b'ar  story,"  clamored  the  children  of  the  house, 
who  were  still  hovering  about  the  store,  in  im 
minent  peril  of  being  sent  to  bed. 

"  Oh,  neow,  childring,"  returned  the  old  man, 
in  his  plaintive  drawling  intonation,  "  ye  don't 
wanter  hear  Jimmy's  story  fust  -off,  do  ye? 
Don't  Sukey,  a  little  dear,  wanter  hear  her  story, 
all  abeout  the  harp  that  seounded  seven  miles 
above  greound,  'n'  seven  miles  under  greound, 
'n'  seven  miles  beyond  sea?" 


IN   THE   COUNTRY   STORE.  99 

"  No,"  stoutly  insisted  the  dominant  Jimmy, 
"  me  'n'  Sukey  wants  ter  hear  'bout  the  b'ars." 

"  Wai,  then,"  replied  their  aged  friend, 
"Jimmy  mus'  come  'n'  set  right  here,  next  ter 
me,  'n'  Sukey  '11  come  up  on  the  old  man's  knee 
—  oops-a-daisy  !  here  she  be  !  Wai,  onct  upon 
a  time,  the'  was  a  little  boy  't  lived  all  alone  with 
his  mother,  'n'  one  day  he  took  his  bahsket  'n 
went  out  inter  the  woods  ter  pick  huckleberries. 
Wai,  he  went,  'n'  he  went,  'n'  he  went  along  a 
leetle  furder,  'n'  he  come  toe  a  grahssy  place,  'n' 
then  he  come  toe  a  middlin'  rocky  place,  'n' 
bimeby  he  diskivered  a  b'ar's  den,  with  three 
little  b'ars,  all  cuggled  down  in  it.  Wai,  he 
tucked  up  them  little  b'ars  in  his  bahsket,  all 
nice,  V  he  buckled  f'r  home.  So  he  went 
along,  an'  along,  an'  along,  an'  he  was  jest  a  say- 
in'  to  hisself  how  dretful  pleased  his  mother  'd  be 
ter  see  them  little  b'ars,  when  all  toe  onct  he 
heered  suthin'  behind  him,  going  brookety, 
brookety,  brook,  an'  he  turned  an'  he  looked, 
an'  he  see  the  old  she  b'ar  comin'  right  arter 
him." 

Here  Uncle  Josey  paused  to  give  place  to 
the  ows  and  owtcJies  of  his  hearers,  who  were 
quivering  in  the  fearful  joy  awakened  by  the 
narrative. 

"Wai,"  pursued  the  story-teller,  "the  little 
boy  he  run,  but  'twa'n't  no  kinder  use;  the  ole 
b'ar  was  gittin'  clus'  up  with  him,  when  he  jes' 


IOO  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

throwcd  out  one  o'  the  little  b'ars,  'thout  stoppin' 
tcr  look  behind  him.  Wai,  the  ole  b'ar  she  nosed 
him,  'n'  licked  him,  V  picked  him  up,  'n'  carr'd 
him  off,  'n'  laid  him  down  in  the  den." 

The  same  history  was  related  concerning  the 
second  cub,  after  which  recital,  — 

"  So  now  the  little  boy  was  mos'  outer  the 
woods,  when  jes'  ez  he  come  in  sight  o'  home 
an'  he  could  see  the  clo'es  hangin'  out  on  the 
line,  all  of  a  suddint  he  heerd  suthin'  behind  him 
goin'  brookety,  brookety,  brookety,  brook,  an' 
there  she  was  codgwallopin'  along  arter  him  ;  an' 
he  pitched  out  the  larst  little  b'ar  'n'  run  lickety 
cut,  lickety  cut,  'n'  he  got  saft  home.  And  his 
mother  was  overjoyed  ter  see  him." 

The  children  disappeared  soon  after  the  close 
of  their  favorite  tale,  but  the  youths  of  the 
neighborhood,  seated  beside  the  counter,  which 
was  lighted  'by  the  whale-oil  lamp  and  the 
tallow  candle,  were  pursuing  the  evening  amuse 
ment  of  playing  fox  and  geese  with  grains  of 
corn,  and  of  puzzling  out,  with  the  help  of  slate 
and  pencil,  the  traditionary  rebus,  "  I  under 
stand  that  you  under-take  toe  over-throw  my 
under-takings." 

In  the  circle  around  the  stove  the  enlivening 
influences  of  snuff  and  tobacco  kept  the  sources 
of  conversational  flow  fully  supplied.  The  usual 
comments  upon  the  weather  and  the  crops  were 
duly  exchanged.  Uncle  Josey  predicted  a  "con- 


IN  THE  COUNTRY  STORE.       IOI 

sid'ble  warm  spell,  on  the  stringth  o'  the  al 
manac,"  though,  as  he  added  with  mild  scepti 
cism,  it  did  n't  always  tell  right.  Uncle  Cy 
Card,  the  carpenter,  related  some  instructive 
reminiscences  of  a  December  famous  in  local 
annals,  when  he  and  the  rest  o'  the  gang  worked 
at  a  raisin'  in  their  shirt-sleeves ;  but  it  was  the 
general  sense  of  the  company  that  winter  never 
rots  in  the  skies.  Old  Polypus  Pollock,  a  prey 
to  the  eccentricity  of  the  paternal  taste  in  no 
menclature,  and  an  inheritor  of  an  inordinate 
love  of  mysterious  phrases,  related  with  exhaus 
tive  minuteness  the  history  of  his  successful 
potato  crop. 

"  Yes,"  he  complacently  observed,  "  I  do 
b'leeve  I  raised  them  'ere  p'taters  ez  a  crop  hed 
oiigJiter  be  raised.  I  'clar'  for  't,  I  did  n't  gin 
'em  no  peace.  I  jest  hoed  an'  weeded,  an' 
weeded  an'  hoed,  all  summer;  the'  wa'n't  no  let 
up  to't;  an'  them  p'taters  did  grow  sponta- 
nously,  toe  be  sure,"  he  concluded,  with  a 
thoughtful  air. 

"What  be  ye  goin'  ter  git  f'r  'em,  Pol?"  was 
the  sharp  inquiry  of  the  astute  Pindar  Pryor. 

"  Wai,  I  ain't  figgered  it  eout  so  fearful  clus', 
yit.  'Ezyou  say, neighbor"  (with  urbanity)  "  they 
be  terr'ble  big.  But  I  don't  hold  to  none  of 
these  here  'nonymous  high  prices ;  a  good,  fa'r, 
promis'cous  price  is  all't  /calc'late  on." 

"  Taters    ain't   what   they   uster   be,"  mildly 


102  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

complained  Uncle  Josey;  "they  don't  taste 
'tatery  this  fall." 

"  Of  all  the  poor  livin'  't  ever  I  don't  wanter 
see,"  dryly  observed  a  dyspeptic-looking  man, 
who  had  not  passed  unscathed  through  the 
ordeal  of  "  boarding  around  "  when  in  his  early 
years  he  had  done  the  State  some  service  as  a 
schoolmaster,  but  without  sacrificing  native  dia 
lect  to  artificial  book-learning,  "  'twas  jest  about 
the  most  mis'able  down  to  Number  Twenty-five, 
when  I  taught  school  there.  Cipherin'  all  day 
with  the  boys,  an  livin'  on  them  mean  johnny- 
cakes  made  'thout  a  drop  o*  milk,  was  ruther  too 
tough  fr  me."  He  paid  the  tribute  of  a  long- 
drawn  yawn  to  the  melancholy  recollection. 

The  staple  topics  being  well-nigh  disposed  of, 
a  silence  fell,  dedicated  to  the  influences  of  the 
soothing  weed,  until  all  were  suddenly  aroused 
into  welcome  activity  by  the  arrival  of  a  neigh 
bor  who,  coming  post-haste  from  a  house  of 
sickness,  briefly  announced  the  animating  intel 
ligence  — 

"Wai,  Pardon  Sherman's  dead, — died  this 
arternoon,  at  twelve  minutes  past  six  o'clock." 

"  I  wanter  know,  now,"  was  the  refreshing 
expletive  in  which  Uncle  Cy  indulged ;  "  Left 
no  much  prop'ty,  I  guess,"  was  the  character 
istic  note  sharply  sounded  by  the  keen-visaged 
Pindar  Pryor;  and  "  VVal,  wal,  he  were  a  very 
likely  man,"  was  Uncle  Josey's  ready  word  of 


IN  THE   COUNTRY   STORE.  103 

obituary  eulogy,  uttered  with  sundry  edifying 
head-shakings,  and  lugubrious  "  sithes,"  as  he 
would  have  named  them. 

"  Ez  toe  thet  ar,"  portentously  announced 
Steve  Reynolds,  or  "  Runnuls,"  a  rough,  middle- 
aged  man,  not  devoid  of  a  certain  air  of  homely 
wash-and-wear  wisdom,  "  I  ain't  so  sure  who  is 
likely,  and  who  ain't.  I  don't  mean  no  affront 
to  nobody  nor  no  disrespec'  ter  the  dead,  but 
sech  news  as  this  here  dooz  allers  call  ter  mind 
thet  ar'  't  we  uster  read  ter  school  in  the  '  C'lum- 
bian  Orator,'  when  one  o'  them  old  wiseacres 
says,  says  he,  '  Call  no  man  happy  till  the  eend 
on  his  days,'  or  some  sech  a  saw  ez  thet. 
Now,  I  ain't  no  flosopher,"  modestly  continued 
Steve,  "  but  I  sh'd  go  a  leetle  furder  'n  thet,  'n' 
I  sh'd  say,  Don't  go  ter  callin'  no  man  good  tell 
he  's  ben  buried  a  year  an'  a  half,  an'  the  grahss 
hes  growed  up  over  him.  F'r  I  Ve  noticed  in 
my  time,"  pursued  Steve,  fixedly  regarding  his 
audience  while  slowly  shifting  his  quid,  "  thet 
with  thet  there  graveyard  grahss  the  's  apt  to 
spring  up  another  crop  thet  ain't  so  handy.  I 
tell  'em,  the  Scriptur  says, '  Death  's  the  Prince  o' 
Darkness,'  but  the'  is  times  when  he  brings  a  lot 
of  ugly  things  ter  light  What 's  thet  you  'm  a 
blurtin'  out  there,  Sol  Simms?  " 

"  Why,  sa-ay,"  stammered  Sol,  with  phenom 
enal  smartness  on  being  thus  encouraged, 
"  there 's  old  Aunt  Patty,  up  't  ourus "  (he 


IO4  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

referred  to  his  great-aunt,  a  member  of  the 
household),  "  she  's  so  good  't  she's  bad.  It's 
dretful  mithersome  ter  hev  her  'round  some 
times,  "fr  when  anybody  else  'd  be  mad  ez  a  hoe, 
she  won't  lay  no  blame  ter  nobody.  But  I  ground 
her  grist  f'r  her  yist'd'y.  Says  I,  speakin'  up 
loud's  I  could,  pretty  nigh,  f'r  the  old  lady's 
deef 's  an  adder,  '  Aunt  Patty,  you  'm  so  mortle 
charit'ble  't  you  allers  says  about  folks  under 
sixty,  ef  they  'm  cross  or  wrong-behaved,  thet 
they'm  sick  an'  can't  help  theirselves,  an'  ef 
they'm  over  sixty,  why  then  they'm  childish 
an'  dono  no  better;'  an'  she  laffed  an"  said, 
'  Git  along,  y'r  father  uster  tell  me  so  long  afore 
you  was  born.' " 

The  more  practical  members  of  the  confer 
ence  had  ill-brooked  the  delay  imposed  by  these 
unprofitable  moralizings,  and  now  obtained  from 
the  willing  narrator  full  particulars  of  the  la 
mented  event.  Curiosity  being  allayed,  specu 
lation  next  ran  rife. 

"  S'pose  the  widder  'n  the  gals  c'n  jest  about 
make  out  ter  ruggle  along,  cain't  they?"  queried 
Uncle  Cy,  with  a  furrowed  brow,  while  his  neg 
lected  pipe  nearly  went  out,  in  his  spasm  of 
'neighborly  anxiety. 

"  Mebbc  some  on  'em  '11  git  marr'd,"  was  the 
brilliant  suggestion  of  Jim  Fones. 

"  I  dono,  I  dono"  pondered  Uncle  Josey, 
with  profound  sympathy;  "they  ain't  none  on 


IN  THE  COUNTRY  STORE.        105 

'em  very  fanciful,  an'  Almiry's  got  a  reg'lar 
drive-on-carter  look  to  her." 

"What  sorter  look?"  questioned  Sol  Simms, 
with  interest. 

"  Don't  you  know  thet  story,  sonny?  Wai, 
away  back  in  some  o'  them  old  times,  the'  was 
a  man  gonter  be  hung,  'n'  they  said  how  they  'd 
gin  him  a  pardon  ef  so  be  't  he  could  git  any 
body  ter  hev  him,  'n'  a  woman  't  come  along  said 
she  would.  So  he  riz  up  in  the  cart  ter  see  her, 
an'  when  he  see  her  he  lay  down  agin.  '  Long 
nose,  an'  crooked  chin,'  says  he ;  '  drive  on, 
carter.' " 

"  Looker  here,  Mr.  Runnuls,"  broke  in  Hi 
Collins,  addressing  Steve,  "  the  's  a  gal  livin'  out, 
down  to  the  bridge,  thet  come  from  up  north, 
som'ers  to  the  northern  fac'tries,  an'  she  's  the 
most  ig'nant  kind.  She  never  see  chicken  an' 
quohaug  pie,  an'  she  did  n't  know  what  con- 
queedles  was !  " 

"  Quonqueedles,  gran'futher  calls  'em,"  re 
marked  Steve.  "  Quonqueedles  was  the  name 
the  old  Injuns  giv'  'em,  'cordin'  ter  his  tell.  I 
sh'd  reckon  it  come  from  their  n'ise,  when 
they'm  a  sorter  tunin'  up.  The'  was  a  man 
come  here  from  some  o'  them  northern  parts, 
called  'em  bob-o-links.  I  expect  thet  ar'  out- 
landlish  name  come  right  down  from  some  o' 
them  dangerous  old  Massachusetts  Prisbyter'ans. 
Uster  go  spyin'  'round  arter  upland  liverwort, 


io6          SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

an'  called  'em  Mayflowers,  I  b'licve.     He  was  a 
gret  han'  f'r'sech  truck. 

"  I  dono  's  you  reck'lect,"  joined  in  Uncle 
Josey,  "  thet  furrin'  sort  o'  creeter,  from  York 
or  Pensylvany,  I  b'lieve." 

"What,  old  Christian  Tim's  raskill  son-in- 
law?  "  asked  Steve.  "  How  the  ole  man  uster 
go  on  'bout  him !  Says  he,  '  His  name  was 
Awle,  an'  he  tho't  he  was  all,  an'  he  took  all, 
an'  he  hed  all.'  " 

"  Jes'  so.  Wai,  he  uster  tell  it  f 'r  true  thct 
whar  he  come  from  the  women-folks  allers 
milked  the  ceows." 

"Sho!"  exclaimed  'Lias  Simins,  an  hitherto 
silent  little  man,  now  wearing  the  air  of  having 
been  forcibly  struck  in  the  face  by  a  missile 
from  that  boomerang  which  Dr.  Holmes  says 
is  the  weapon  carried  by  the  man  of  facts  in  a 
social  company ;  then,  with  a  rapid  adjustment 
of  his  quickened  intellects  to  the  new  situation, 
"  Wai,  I  vow,  they  hed  oughter !  "  he  announced, 
with  an  explosive  energy  that  provoked  a  loud 
laugh,  —  it  being  the  general  understanding  that 
Dame  Simins  was  one  who  knew  her  rights, 
and,  knowing,  dared  maintain. 

"  I  ain't  much  knowin'  ter  furriners,"  cau 
tiously  preluded  the  cross-roads  blacksmith,  Jenk- 
son  Castle,  "  don't  know,  —  cain't  tell  —  hain't 
seen,  —  but  I  Ve  hearn  tell  't  they  'm  hed  three 
on  'em  up  't  the  big  house  this  summer  stid  o' 


IN  THE  COUNTRY  STORE.        IO/ 

squaws."  (African  squaws  were  in  his  mind.) 
"  Three.  I-rish  maids,"  they  said,  he  repeated, 
carefully,  as  one  speaking  under  possible  cor 
rection.  "  I  never  see  'em  myself,  I  say,  but 
my  woman,  she 's  ben  up  there  with  huckle 
berries,  an'  she  spoke  well  on  'em  too.  Said 
they  treated  on  her  harnsome,  very  harnsome. 
an'  gin'  her  a  dish  o'  tea.  But  it  stan's  to  rea 
son  they  cain't  airn  the  salt  ter  their  porridge 
up  there.  Nothin'  ter  do,  ez  ye  may  say,  but 
set  'n'  suck  their  paws,  like  a  woodchuck  in 
Jenooary." 

"  'T  was  an  I-rish  fellar  laid  thet  new  piece  o' 
stun  wall  out  ter  the  Dilly  Carly  place,  ter  the 
old  mill,"  observed  Steve.  "  Ky-arn  Driscoll, 
his  name  was." 

"What,  toe  the  old  Twin  Chimbley  house?" 
queried  the  blacksmith,  with  a  quickened  accent, 
"  I  wanter  know  !  Wai,  I  would  n't  tho't  one  on 
'em  could  airn  fo'pence-ha'penny  a  day.  I 
calc'lated  they  was  jest  fit  ter  cooter  'round. 
But  Nailer  Tom  told  me  thet  was  a  harnsome 
piece  o'  work.  He  never  said  who  done  it, 
though." 

From  these  practical  topics  a  transition  was 
gradually  made,  as  the  evening  wore  on,  to 
those  of  a  less  definite  character;  and  with 
the  return  to  weather-speculations  came  a  dis 
cussion  as  to  that  weather-breeder,  the  Pala 
tine  Light.  Steve's  great  yellow  cur  yawned 


108  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

cavernously,  as  if  he  thought  it  a  stale  and 
unprofitable  subject,  but  his  master  paid  due 
attention  to  the  spokesman  of  the  moment. 

"  I  hayve  saw,"  said  Uncle  Josey,  speaking 
with  the  modest  confidence  of  one  who  knew 
how,  on  occasion,  to  keep  his  footing  among, 
the  treacherous  parts  of  speech.  "  I  hayve  saw 
them  ez  seed  the  ole  Pal'tine  with  their  own 
livin',  breathin'  eyes." 

"  Why,  the  Jedge  see  it,  time  an'  agin,  on 
the  ole  Queen's  Anne  road,  didn't  he?"  trucu 
lently  demanded,  with  an  air  as  of  personal 
resentment,  Zach  Humford,  a  kind  of  human 
grasshopper  in  voice  and  "  build." 

"  No,"  demurred  Steve,  guardedly,  "  I  dono's 
he  ever  said  's  he  see  it  over  'n  above  onct  or 
twicet." 

"Wai,"  fiercely  returned  the  grasshopper,  who 
gave  every  indication  of  becoming  a  burden, 
"  this  I  will  say,  an'  stan'  to  it,  the  Jedge  were 
a  very  likely  man." 

"  Nothin'  agin'  thet,  neighbor,"  spoke  Steve, 
concisely,  but  heartily. 

"  He  were  a  likely  man,  I  say,"  retorted  the 
grasshopper,  with  the  air  of  having  been  flatly 
contradicted,  "a  ve-ry  likely  man"  —  swinging 
a  heavily  booted  leg,  and  viciously  kicking  the 
wood-box  —  "and  I  don't  kcer  a  fiddle-string 
who  hears  me  say  it." 

"  S'pos'in   we   sh'd   ax    Gran'futhcr   Runnuls 


IN  THE  COUNTRY  STORE.       109 

about  it,"  suggested  the  pacific  Uncle  Josey. 
"  I  sh'd  railly  like  ter  hear  the  ole  gentleman 
talk,"  he  added,  with  the  patronizing  tolerance 
of  age  for  senility. 

"  Gran'futher  Runnuls,"  who  held  that  rela 
tion  to  the  middle-aged  Steve,  had  thus  far 
remained  a  dormant  intelligence,  isolated  by 
his  deafness,  but  tranquilly  absorbing  the  warmth 
of  the  fire  into  his  lean,  old-world  figure.  His 
long  white  hair  was  tied  in  a  black  ribbon 
queue,  but  a  gay  bandanna  handkerchief  pro 
tected  his  crown.  His  eyes  still  twinkled  keenly 
beneath  his  frosty  brows. 

"  Better  not  git  gran'futher  started,"  warned 
Steve.  "  He  ain't  so  easy  to  wind  up,  when  ye 
git  through  with  him,  now  I  tell  ye.  He 's  an 
old,  aged  man,  gran'futher  is." 

"  I  '11  resk  him,"  snapped  the  grasshopper, 
spurred  on  by  this  opposition  to  put  himself  in 
communication  with  the  patriarch  by  shouting 
in  his  ear. 

"  Say,  Gran'futher,  tell  us  all  about  the 
Pal' tine,  'n'  who  see  it,  won't  ye  ?  " 

"Yes,  yes,"  responded  the  ancient  one,  appar 
ently  in  cheerful  assent,  "  Yes,  I  'm  a  gret  age, 
I  am.  Nigh  upon  ninety  year  old,  most  ninety 
odd.  I  'm  the  oldes'  freeman  in  this  here  town, 
sir ! " 

"  Stop,  he  hearn  ye  well  "nough,"  spoke  Steve, 
arresting  the  grasshopper  in  another  attempt  at 


1 10  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

dictation.  "  He  hears  ye,  but  he  won't  hear  toe 
ye.  He  allers  goes  on  thct  way  awhile."  (Steve 
had  a  manner  as  of  calling  attention  to  some 
curious,  but  slightly  damaged  piece  of  mech 
anism.)  "  Lor',  he  don't  sc'ace  ever  notice  what 
you  say,  but  goes  'n'  tells  over  a  lurry  all  'bout 
his  age,  jest  like  some  youngster  't  says,  '  I  'm 
half-past  ten,  goin'  on  'leven.'  He 's  proud  ez 
a  peacock  on  his  age,  an'  now  you  'm  spoke  to 
him,  bimeby  he'll  tell  ye  somethin',  but  he  don't 
take  no  orders  from  folks.  Seems  so  he 's  way 
off,  kinder,  'n*  you  could  n't  git  at  him,  noway." 
Steve  sawed  the  air  vaguely  but  vigorously  with 
both  arms,  in  the  endeavor  to  express  these  met 
aphysical  niceties.  "  There,  he 's  most  ready," 
he  continued,  and  gestured,  as  if  he  had  said  of 
a  venerable  time-piece,  "  Hark,  she  's  a-goin'  ter 
strike !  " 

"Neighbors  an'  frien's,"  began  the  patriarch, 
lifting  his  head,  and  speaking  in  a  quaint  tone  of 
old-time  mannerliness.  "  I  ben  a  thinkin',  while 
settin'  here,  ez  the  Quakers  says  [this  seemed 
to  be  some  antiquated  relic  of  pleasantry] 
abeout  them  times  inter  the  old  Rev'lution." 

"  My  glory !  "  loudly  exclaimed  Sol  Simms 
to  his  crony,  Hi  Collins,  "  be  thet  old  critter  a 
steerin'  full  tilt  f'r  them  red-coats  agin?" 

"  I  ain't  heerd  him  meander  on  about  'em  mor' 
'n  forty-'leven  times,  hev  you,  Sol?"  returned 
the  brilliant  Collins,  with  fine  sarcastic  power. 


IN  THE  COUNTRY   STORE.  Ill 

"  Le  's  go  'long  !  "  suggested  Sol ;  which  they 
did,  with  much  clumping  of  awkward  feet  in 
clumsy  boots. 

Of  those  who  remained  it  might  be  said  that 

"  They  all  sat  round  in  attitudes 
Of  various  dejection," 

as,  with  a  bright  and  happy  look,  the  aged  nar 
rator  began,  after  a  rather  rambling  fashion,  — 

"  Many 's  the  time  our  folks  hes  talked  it  over, 
how  the  red-coats  come  here.  I  wa'n't  to  home 
then,  ye  know.  I  was  up  to  Exeter,  livin'  eout 
with  some  o'  the  quality.  Most  all  on  the  Tory 
folks  went  V  staid  up  there  them  times.  Wai, 
'twas  to  No'thup's  the  red-coats  brung  up  fust. 
The  folks  heerd  a  n'ise  in  the  dead  o'  night,  V 
when  they  looked  out,  the  yard  was  full  o'  red 
coats.  Them  was  cur'ous  times.  They  fired  a 
bullet  through  the  front  door,  jes'  ter  let  'em 
know  they  was  comin'  in,  I  s'pose.  The  bullet 
hole  's  there  ter  this  day,  ye  know.  No'thup's 
folks  never  would  hev'  it  teched. 

"  VVal,  No'thup's  three  ahnts  was  a  livin'  with 
him,  toe  the  old  place.  Them  No'thup  gals  was 
kinder  gittin'  along.  They  was  mighty  nigh  of 
an  age,  but  Tabithy,  she  was  the  youngest  on 
'em,  why,  she  must  ha'  ben  nigh  upon  eighty 
year  old.  She  slep'  alone  in  the  sto'  bedroom, 
V  when  she  heerd  the  n'ise  'n'  commotion  in  the 
house,  'n'  the  trampin'  o'  the  Ted-coats,  she  riz 
up  in  bed,  jest  ez  the  hull  posse  on  'em  got  ter 


I  1 2  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

her  door,  'n'  was  filin'  in.  She  sot  up  'mazin 
stiff,  f'r  she  'd  allers  slep'  in  her  stays,  an'  her 
nightkip  nodded  kind  of  awful,  an'  says  she, 
pretty  middlin'  starn,  but  her  v'ice  sort  o'  dyin' 
away  into  an  eecho,  toe  the  larst  on  it,  '  What 
be  you  folks  a-doin'  on?'  The  head  man  on 
'em,  says  he,  quick  enough,  '  Quiet  y'rself, 
marm,  we  'm  on'y  a  sarchin'  f'r  men.'  But  with 
thet  she  giv'  a  screech  —  a  tol'able  loud  one  — 
'  Wha-a-t !  Sarchin'  f'r  men,  in  my  room  !  '  an' 
flinged  herself  back  on  the  piller,  in  conniption 
fits,  an'  swoonded  dead  away.  Wai,  I  s'pose 
she  felt  obleeged  to,"  pondered  the  narrator, 
considerately.  "  But  she  hed  ter  come  to  her 
self  by  herself,  f'r  the'  wa'n't  nobody  ter  pay  no 
'tention  to  her;  the  red-coats  was  in  airnest,  an' 
they  kep'  a  sarchin'  an'  a  sarchin'  in  ev'ry  hole 
an'  corner,  tell  they  lighted  on  Mr.  No'thup,  ez 
he  was  purtectin'  his  prop'ty  from  a  p'sition 
he  'd  took  up  under  the  gret  heap  o'  wool  under 
the  eaves  in  the  garr't.  Wai,  they  took  him  an' 
yoked  him  up,  and  carr'd  him  off  ter  Newport  f'r 
a  dan-ger-ous  rebel.  But  the  best  on't  was 
when  they  was  on  the  way,  a-marchin'  past  the 
old  Squire's,  where  toe  thet  self-same  time  the' 
was  a  comp'ny  of  Cont'nentals  a  quartered  in 
the  gret  room,  —  eighty  on  'em  slep'  all  over  the 
floor.  One  on  'em  had  seen  some  sarvice, — 
I  've  hearn  tell  he  'd  shot  a  dead  Hessian ;  but 
howsumever,  thet's  neither  here  nor  there. 


IN  THE   COUNTRY  STORE.  113 

Wai,  the  head  man  o'  them  red-coats,  —  the  cen- 
tur/on,  I  sh'd  call  him, — he  come  all  to  a  halt, 
an'  says  he  ter  No'thup,  '  What 's  the  politics 
with  these  here?'  Mr.  No'thup,  says  he,  'Oh, 
they  'm  all  peaceable  folks,  very  peaceable.' 
'  Humph,'  says  he  agin,  wheelin'  round  on  him 
kinder  short,  '  What 's  the  meanin'  o'  all  them 
there  lights  ?  '  An'  them  was  the  watch-lights 
the  sogers  burnt,  but  never  knowed  a  breath 
about  who  an'  what  was  near  'em.  '  Wai,'  says 
No'thup,  '  they  'm  got  a  child  thet  's  terr'ble  apt 
ter  hev  the  croup,  an'  't  ain't  no  oncommon  sight 
ter  see  lights  'roun'  there  any  time  o'  night.' 
So  fin'lly  he  was  pacified,  an'  they  moved  on ; 
but  the  old  Squire  never  hed  chick  nor  child 
in  his  life,  an'  how  he  happened  to  think  on't, 
No'thup  uster  say,  he  never  did  rightly  know. 
It  was  clear  luck  an'  chance  f 'r  'em.  He  knowed 
that  ar'  custguard,  ez  they  called  'em,  wa'n't 
very  fit  ter  wrastle  with  reg'lars.  Most  they  was 
good  for,  the  Squire's  wife  tho't,  was  ter  keep 
bread  from  mouldin'.  She  wa'n't  very  frien'ly 
to  'em,  an'  they  writ  up  all  'roun'  the  walls  o' 
the  gret  room,  '  Hang  the  old  she-Tory!  '  The 
Squire  was  ev'ry  bit  an'  grain  's  much  a  Tory  ez 
she  was,  but  he  did  n't  say  nothin',  ye  see.  She 
would  sputter  right  out,  'n'  thet's  how  she  got 
the  Squire  inter  trouble,  so  't  the  Committee  o' 
Safety  kep'  an  eye  on  him,  an'  quartered  them 
troops  on  him.  Wai,  she  was  high-sperited,  an' 


114  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

things  was  gettin'  middlin'  bitter,  but  it  run 
along,  an'  so,  fin'lly  —  " 

"  Look  here,  gran'futher !  "  interrupted  Steve, 
manfully  stemming  the  swelling  tide  of  remi 
niscence,  "  time  to  be  goin',  now !  " 

"Don't  you  go  to  discumboberate  me,  Steve," 
complained  the  aged  one,  after  a  pause,  and  a 
slight  start.  "  I  b'lieve  I  was  jest  goin'  ter  say 
suthin'." 

"  Wai,  say  it  ter  home,  then,"  roughly  but 
not  unkindly  returned  tho  grandson,  tendering 
his  sire  his  walking-stick.  "  They  'm  most  all 
gone  home  now.  Nine  o'clock  !  Jim 's  a  shut- 
tin'  up !  Say,  Jim,  fasten  up  tight  ter  keep  out 
them  red-coats  ter  night,  ye  know,"  he  jocosely 
admonished,  as,  closing  the  door  behind  him, 
he  adjusted  his  sturdy  tread  to  the  shuffling 
steps  of  age,  and  the  two  groped  homeward  in 
the  darkness,  while  the  whip-poor-will's  wild 
note  sounded  again  and  yet  again  from  the 
wooded  hill  that  overhung  their  pathway. 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE   'SIAS'S. 


planting  time  had  begun  with  the 
softly-overcast  April  days,  and  Uncle  'Sias 
Grumly's  fields  were  rich  with  the  moist  warm 
browns  of  the  freshly  turned  furrows,  traced  by 
the  toil  of  Stout  and  Starling,  the  ungainly  oxen 
that  now  stood  with  bowed  heads,  rigid  as  mon 
oliths,  while  waiting  to  be  unyoked  by  their 
master  and  his  hired  man,  Brandywine  Spears. 

The  west  was  bright  with  that  peculiarly  vivid 
yellow  light  that  is  usually  a  precursor  of  rain. 
Touched  by  this  transitory  radiance,  which 
streamed  richly  from  beneath  an  overhanging 
mass  of  densely  purpling  vapors,  the  stretches 
of  bushy  pasture,  and  the  wooded  uplands,  glit 
tering  with  moisture  and  aglow  with  the  almost 
autumnal  brilliancy  of  early  leafage,  were  quick 
ened  into  a  burst  of  magical  bloom  and  bright 
ness.  The  unearthly  splendor  was  repeated  in 
the  shining  links  and  windings  of  the  sinuous 
Quacataug  Pond,  which,  by  Nature's  massive 
mimicry,  simulated  a  river  of  many  turns,  with 
sudden  surprises  of  narrowing  channels  and  de 
vices  of  semi-islands  that  became  peninsulas  at 


Il6  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

low  water.  The  same  law  of  caprice  and  change 
reappeared  in  the  diversity  of  its  banks,  which 
afforded  the  alternate  varieties  of  grassy  slopes 
and  wooded,  rocky  steeps.  Young  white  birches 
of  an  airy,  feminine  grace,  stood  bathing  their 
feet  in  the  ripples,  like  veritable  dryads,  or 
danced  to  the  light  breeze  that  sprang  up  at 
sunset,  quickening  the  mobile  play  of  the  sensi 
tive  waters ;  and  aged,  dying  white  birches, 
caught  fast  in  the  myriad  tangles  of  the  droop 
ing  gray  moss,  piteously  lifted  their  fettered  and 
withered  limbs,  like  victims  wreathed  for  druid- 
ical  sacrifice.  A  group  of  blighted  sycamores 
on  a  hill  overlooking  the  lake,  the  leopardine 
markings  of  their  trunks  relieved  against  the 
blackening  sky,  began  to  wave  their  tortured 
branches  with  a  warning  murmur,  breathing  of 
night  and  storm.  The  soldier  blackbirds,  though 
displaying  their  gay  red  wings  with  all  their 
customary  twilight  flutter  and  bustle,  yet  seemed 
to  tune  their  closing  bugle-song  with  an  occa 
sional  note  of  serious  preparation  for  hostile 
weather. 

But  the  warm  yellow  light  in  the  west  still  lin 
gered,  bathing  the  whole  stretch  of  country  in  a 
transfiguring  glow  which  held  the  eye  with  al 
most  the  same  effect  of  a  sudden  revelation  of 
new  beauty  in  familiar  scenes  as  is  afforded  by 
the  magical  touches  of  a  light  snowfall;  though 
the  darkening  clouds  constantly  lowered  upon 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE  'SIAS'S.      1 1/ 

the  horizon,  fast  obscuring  the  parting  smile  of 
the  many-minded  April  day. 

"  Open  an'  shet,  sign  o'  wet,"  sapiently  com 
mented  Brandywine  Spears,  who,  while  awaiting 
the  call  to  supper,  was  whittling  at  a  small  block 
intended  as  a  wheel  for  the  toy  go-cart  which  he 
was  rudely  fashioning  for  his  youthful  son. 

"  'T  won't  hender  'em  none,"  replied  Uncle 
'Sias,  from  his  momentary  resting-place  on  the 
horse-block,  and  speaking  with  a  certain  asper 
ity  of  tone,  evidently  addressed  to  some  latent 
quality  of  his  companion's  manner  and  intent. 
"  These  here  young  converts  ain't  none  of  y'r 
fair-weather  Christians." 

"No,  thet  they  ain't,"  emphatically  admitted 
the  other,  with  the  suspicious  facility  of  an  opin 
ionated  opponent  who  has  a  telling  point  to 
make ;  "  it 's  the  fair  weather,  yer  know,  thet 's 
goin'  ter  be  too  much  f  r  'em,  putty  soon,  Uncle 
'Sias.  An  airly  spring,  ez  it  mought  be  this 
here,  an'  sultry  days  comin'  on  so  fast  is  turrible 
tryin'  ter  young  converts.  Th'  ole  Elder  —  I 
heerd  him  exhortin'  of  'em  las'  Thu'sd'y  evenin', 
down  ter  the  schoolus  meetin'  — 

"  Beware,  Brandywine,"  interrupted  honest 
Uncle  'Sias,  with  genuine  concern,  "  lest,  havin' 
enj'yed  the  means  o'  grace,  yer  should  y'rself  be 
a  castaway." 

"  Wai,  ez  I  was  a-sayin',"  pursued  the  undis 
mayed  serving-man,  acknowledging  this  warning 


Il8  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

only  by  a  dry  nod,  "  he  gin  'cm  consid'ble  of  a 
talkin'  to.  Told  'em  how  they  was  the  bloomin' 
harvest  of  a  precious  revival  season.  Plants  o' 
grace,  he  called  'em.  Wai,  mebbe  they  be ;  but 
they  'm  mighty  short-lived  ones.  Yer  know 
well  'nough  how  't  is  with  the  heft  on  'em,  Uncle 
'Sias.  Takes  all  winter  long,  in  the  fust  place, 
ter  git  'em  started.  Paul  plantin'  an'  'Polios 
waterin',  an'  all  the  women-folks,  in  a  go-round 
continooally  on  account  of  'em.  'Long  about 
March,  they  do  'pear  ter  take  holt  some,  an'  all 
toe  onct,  clear  away  they  go,  heightin'  up  in  a 
gret  growth,  ekil  ter  Jonah's  gourd.  'Bout  the 
latter  eend  o'  Aprile,  some  on  'em  gits  kinder 
spindlin'.  They  can't  stand  warm  weather,  noway 
in  the  world ;  the  May  sun  wilts  'em  clean  down 
ter  the  ground;  an'  time  June  comes  in,  what 
with  fishin',  an'  layin'  round  in  the  shade,  an' 
goin'  down  the  pond,  an" — an'  sich  —  they 'm 
all  broke  up  f  r  meetin'  folks.  All  flesh  is  grahss, 
I  expect,  Uncle  'Sias,  saints  'n'  sinners  'n'  all." 

"  Ef  yer  would  n't  go  down  the  pond  so  much 
yerself,  Brandywine  Spears,  'long  of  a  jug  with 
a  corn-cob  stopple,  an'  I  won't  say  jest  what  in 
side  on  it,"  admonished  Uncle  'Sias,  with  whole 
some  severity,  "  mebbe  yer  would  n't  fault  the 
Lord's  work  an'  the  Lord's  sarvants  so  much." 

"  Wai,  Uncle,  mebbe  you  'm  got  the  right 
on 't  there,"  confessed  the  unabashed  culprit, 
with  calmly  philosophic  equipoise,  "  an'  mebbe 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE  'SIAS'S.      119 

I'm  in  the  right  on't  in  my  notions  consarnin' 
these  here  young  folks,"  he  continued,  with  per 
sistent  scepticism.  "  Ef  our  foresight  was  as 
good  as  our  hindsight,  we  sh'd  all  on  us  done 
diff'rent  by  times,  /  expect;  but  them  new 
converts  —  shucks  !  Uncle  'Sias,  you  an'  me 's 
seen  a  long  lot  on  'em,  an'  7  never  see  the  time 
yit  when  the  month  o'  May  wa'n't  a  mighty 
criticle  junctur  f  r  'em." 

The  call  to  supper  filled  the  pause  that  Uncle 
'Sias  apparently  deemed  it  fruitless  to  occupy 
with  further  admonitions;  and  pious  yeoman 
and  sceptical  swain  were  presently  sharing  the 
bounties  of  the  board,  around  which  the  house 
hold  had  first  stood,  while  the  former  with  closed 
eyes  repeated,  in  slightly  Puritanic  accents,  a 
long-drawn  grace. 

Aunt  Freelove  Grumly,  Uncle  'Sias's  wife,  pre 
sided  at  the  supper,  having  previously  completed 
her  toilet  for  the  evening  exercises  by  donning 
even  such  superfluities  of  dress  as  shoes  and 
stockings.  Great-aunt  Grumly,  a  frugal  eater, 
who  never  took  supper,  sat  rigidly  upright  on 
the  dye-tub  in  the  chimney  corner,  vigorously 
knitting,  her  long  apron-strings  tied  round  her 
waist  to  keep  steady  a  corn  cob  that  formed  her 
knitting-sheath.  A  box  of  the  ever  useful  cobs, 
spared  from  those  that  were  stored  for  the  pro 
cess  of  curing  the  hams  and  the  "  buckies  "  of 
last  season,  stood  ready  to  be  carried  to  the 


120  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

Franklin  stove  in  the  damp  and  musty  "  great 
room,"  where  the  meeting  would  be  held.  The 
grandchildren  of  the  house  were  building  log- 
cabins  from  the  abundant  store,  the  girl  intent 
on  her  toppling  cobhouse,  and  the  boy  just 
deserting  his  structure  to  deck  himself  with  a 
pasteboard  helmet,  edged  with  a  circlet  of  turkey 
feathers,  the  better  to  "  play  Injun  "  by  rushing 
with  ruthless  uproar  upon  a  rather  phlegmatic 
baby,  creeping  in  tortoise-like  attitudes  on  the 
fireplace-hearth,  and  bearing  marks  of  having 
painfully  traversed  the  sandy  desert  that  occu 
pied  the  centre  of  the  room,  and  which  with 
careful  strokes  of  the  broom,  had  been  adorned 
with  the  approved  "  herring-bone  "  pattern. 

"  Deary  me,  Nate,"  mildly  expostulated  his 
grandmother,  "  you  '11  skeer  the  baby  out  of  a 
year's  growth.  There,  you  'm  fairly  skeered 
the  wits  out  of  him,"  she  continued,  as  the 
infant,  transfixed  between  wonder  and  terror, 
decided  for  the  latter  emotion,  and  gave  it  voice, 
with  gratifying  evidence  of  lung-power. 

"  Guess  not,"  tartly  remarked  Great-aunt 
Grumly,  who  favored  the  sprightly  Nate,  and 
failed  to  see  in  the  babe  a  child  of  promise. 
"  I  '11  resk  him.  Nought's  never  in  danger,  ez 
ever  I  heerd  tell  on !  " 

The  rain,  which  had  fallen  in  occasional  warm 
"  fog-showers  "  through  the  day,  but  had  held 
up,  as  Uncle  'Sias  said,  for  a  milkin'  slatch,  had 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE   'SIAS'S.       121 

not  yet  begun  again,  and  the  attendants  upon 
the  series  of  house-to-house  meetings  that  were 
holden  as  the  sequelae  of  the  recent  revival, 
began  to  arrive  in  numbers  that  implied  as  full 
possession  of  the  premises  as  if  the  summons 
had  been  a  funereal  one.  Not  only  the  great 
room,  where  the  Elder  sat,  behind  the  light- 
stand  and  Bible,  with  the  high  mantelpiece, 
ranged  with  home-made  candles,  for  a  back 
ground,  was  occupied  ;  but  the  borrowed  chairs 
of  the  occasion  scraped  and  creaked  on  the 
floors,  painted  and  unpainted,  floors  sanded  or 
scantily  rug-covered,  of  the  lower  story.  Parlor, 
kitchen,  and  bedroom  adjoining  the  two  were 
fast  filling  with  a  company  presumably  including 
that  personage  so  often  affectionately  inquired 
for  by  Elder  Bayles,  in  his  favorite  form  of 
appeal  opening  with  the  rhetorical  supposition, 
"  If  there  's  a  sinner  here  to-night,  within  the 
sound  of  my  voice,"  —  a  use  of  the  subjunctive 
mood  which  did  but  scant  justice  to  the  search 
ing  qualities  of  that  powerful  and  piercing 
organ.  The  "Elder's"  official  claims  to  bear 
that  Scriptural  designation  were  not,  perhaps, 
very  clearly  made  out;  but  he  was  rated  as  a 
highly  acceptable  leader  of  the  domestic  meet 
ings;  and  none  of  his  hearers  were  prone  to 
give  themselves  any  anxiety  about  the  exact 
spiritual  value  of  his  brevet  title,  so  long  as  they 
found  his  manner  a  satisfactory  compromise 


122  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

between  that  of  the  minister  and  the  layman, 
and  continued  to  esteem  him  a  much  "smarter  " 
speaker  than  others  of  more  assured  ecclesias 
tical  position,  —  as,  for  instance,  the  wandering 
Elder  Nahum  Holley,  who,  on  this  occasion, 
was  simply  tolerated  as  a  second  in  the  leader 
ship  of  the  evening's  devotion. 

These  devotions  were,  like  those  of  more 
sophisticated  people,  things  of  mixed  motive 
and  various  results.  The  unknown  writer  of 
some  popular  rhymes,  which  succinctly  relate 
the  different  causes  promoting  the  assembling  at. 
church  of  a  congregation  in  town,  and  ending 
with  this  characterization  of  a  faithful  few, 
"  And  some  go  there  to  worship  God,"  would 
have  found  equal  scope  for  his  satire  in  the 
rustic  prayer-meeting.  So  long  as  the  mingling 
qualities  of  human  nature  remain  an  indivisible 
compound  of  fine  gold  and  coarse  clay,  so  long 
will  the  satirist  and  the  humorist  find  a  legiti 
mate  field  of  observation  in  every  popular  gath- 
ing,  whether  met  for  mirth  or  mourning,  for 
local  government  or  social  worship.  Neither 
we  nor  our  neighbors  can  divest  ourselves  of 
our  human  attributes,  even  in  our  prayers  and 
hymns ;  and  the  smile  with  which  we  note  the 
incidental  humors  of  the  hour  does  no  wrong  to 
the  respect  ^with  which  we  regard  its  serious 
motives.  Nay,  it  may  be  as  harmless  as  even 
the  earnestness  of  the  simple  souls  to  whom 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE   'BIAS'S.        12$ 

certain  observances  that  are  perhaps  things 
remote  from  our  needs  bring  a  genuine  spiritual 
refreshment  To  the  worthy  Uncle  'Sias  and 
his  peers,  welcoming  as  they  did  the  influences 
of  the  special  form  of  religious  sentiment  in 
which  they  had  been  reared,  there  was  no  dero 
gation  from  the  honor  due  to  sacred  offices  in 
thus  administering  them  without  obvious  cause 
beneath  a  roof  associated  only  with  the  common 
uses  of  life.  "  The  beauty  of  holiness,"  as  man 
ifested  in  the  outward  decencies  of  worship,  was 
a  meaningless  phrase  to  him  and  his  spiritual 
kin.  Let  it  be  granted  that  they  might  be  none 
the  worse,  in  the  tougher  texture  of  their  moral 
fabric,  for  this  deprivation ;  yet  it  is  certain  that 
they  were  none  the  more  fortunate,  in  the  last 
development  of  their  higher  qualities,  for  the 
conditions  to  which  they  were  born.  Says  an 
able  student  of  the  history  of  our  progressive 
civilization :  "  It  has  come  to  pass,  from  a 
variety  of  causes,  that  religion  is  offered  to  the 
eyes  of  this  nation,  for  the  most  part,  under  a 
contemptible  aspect,  and  without  those  accesso 
ries  which  strike  the  senses  and  move  the  heart 
with  a  due  apprehension  of  her  heavenly  origin, 
and  of  a  dignity  and  greatness  above  the  com 
mon  way  of  the  world."  The  same  observer 
would  further  have  said  of  such  surroundings  of 
this  scene  as  the  high-piled  feather  bed  of  state 
in  the  corner  of  the  great  room,  the  litter  of  cobs 


124  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

around  the  stove,  and  Aunt  Freclovc's  best 
bonnet  and  shawl  grotesquely  occupying  the 
settee,  "  These  are  accompaniments  of  a  secular 
izing  of  religion,  whereby  she  is  stripped  of  the 
reverence  which  is  her  own,  and  exposed  to  an 
unjust  humiliation." 

These  untoward  influences,  inseparable  from 
the  presence  of  the  familiar  surroundings,  might 
possibly  be  traced  in  the  riotous  demeanor  of 
Uncle  "Sias's  twin  grandsons,  Nate  and  Date, 
over  whom  he  daily  lamented  as  "  the  most  mis- 
chievousest  wild  colts  't  ever  he  see"  and  who 
could  only  be  withheld  by  the  sternest  watching, 
and  by  whispered  threats  (made  with  a  curiously 
unconscious  disparagement  of  the  nature  of  re 
ligious  privileges  )  of  holding  a  season  of  prayer 
'over  them  when  the  folks  wrere  gone,  from  indulg 
ing  in  unseemly  demonstrations  of  humorous  de 
light  in  Elder  Holley's  well-known  peculiarities 
of  twitching  his  shaggy  eyebrows,  rolling  his  gro 
tesquely  heavy  head,  and  displaying  other  John 
sonian  contortions  of  countenance,  —  thus  mani 
festing  his  sympathy  with  the  devotion  of  the 
presiding  elder  in  his  opening  prayer.  Great- 
aunt  Grumly,  always  a  rather  "  fractious  "  old 
lady,  and  no  easy  subject  of  admonition,  set  an 
indecorous  example  by  persisting  in  her  knitting ; 
and  when  Uncle  'Sias,  regardless  of  his  painfully 
audible  "squeak-leather"  boots,  made  his  slow 
way  up  to  her  with  a  whispered  remonstrance, 


EVENING  MEETING  AT   UNCLE   'SIAS'S.      12$ 

she  testily  responded,  with  a  peevish  clicking 
of  her  needles,  and  by  no  means  in  smothered 
tones :  — 

"  Lemme  'lone,  'Sias,  lemme  'lone;  't won't 
hender  Sim  Bayles's  prayin'  none  ef  I  do  reel  off 
a  bout  or  two  on  y  'r  socks.  Lord  knows  ye 
hain  't  got  a  hull  pair  ter  yer  feet,  now." 

Some  of  the  young  people  who  were  grouped 
in  conveniently  retired  corners  were  severely 
overtaken  with  giggles  at  this  frank  announce 
ment,  and  suffered  comical  agonies ;  or,  as  they 
expressed  it  afterwards,  they  thought  die  they 
should.  Uncle  'Sias  looked  worried  and  anx 
ious.  It  really  seemed  as  if  the  Puritan  tithing- 
man,  with  his  rod  of  office  for  the  discipline  of 
such  offenders,  were  an  indispensable  functionary 
of  the  farmhouse  prayer-meeting.  Few  other 
interruptions  followed  just  then,  however,  except 
that  a  young  woman  who  had  insisted  on  coming 
to  the  meeting  while  undergoing  an  attack  of 
toothache,  whose  swollen  features  were  ban 
daged  with  a  folded  handkerchief  pinned  be 
neath  the  chin,  and  who  from  time  to  time  leaned 
her  head  wearily  in  her  mother's  lap,  naturally 
felt  privileged  to  utter  an  occasional  groan ; 
which  might  be  interpreted  to  edification,  as  sig 
nifying  concern  of  mind  no  less  than  distress  of 
body.  Also,  an  aged  sister,  commonly  called, 
without  regard  to  her  proper  name,  Aunt  Rooty, 
from  her  vocation  as  a  purveyor  of  simples,  being 


126  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

afflicted  with  stoutness  and  deafness,  and  occu 
pying  one  of  the  chief  seats,  was  armed  with  a 
huge,  rustling  palm-leaf  fan,  and  flagellated 
herself  therewith,  in  an  aggressively  noisy 
fashion,  inaudible  to  herself,  but  which  might 
have  grated  harshly  upon  the  nerves  of  sen 
sitive  listeners. 

The  prayer  went  on,  nevertheless,  to  the  satis 
faction  of  the  hearers,  to  whom  it  was  frankly 
addressed,  under  the  very  thin  veil  of  an  oc 
casional  form  of  supplication.  Nobody's  gravity 
was  moved  when,  by  a  slight  confusion  of  ideas, 
the  speaker,  in  remembering  a  bereaved  family 
of  the  neighborhood,  prayed  fervently  for  the 
parents  of  the  poor  little  orphan  that  lay  in  the 
coffin;  nobody  found  it  noticeable  when  he 
corrected  a  trifling  misstatement  which  he  had 
inadvertently  made,  and  amended  his  petition 
in  behalf  of  "  an  afflicted  brother  of  this  town," 
by  catching  himself  up  with  the  words,  "  or,  I 
would  say,  jest  over  the  line,  inter  Exeter,  but " 
(on  further  reflection,  and  in  an  off-hand  tone) 
"  O  Lord,  it  ain't  partickerler  which ;  "  nobody 
in  the  assemblage  was  startled  when  in  closing 
he  prayed  with  superfluous  fervor  that  iniquity 
might  be  showered  down  plenteously  upon  all 
of  them;  for  such  as  these  were  his  staple 
phrases,  of  which  any  one  of  his  audience 
might  have  said,  in  Dr.  Holland's  words :  — 

"  And   I   suppose,  that   in   his   prayers   and 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE  'SIAS'S.      I2/ 

graces,  I  Ve  heard  them  all  at  least  a  thousand 
times." 

An  unacceptable  brother,  Hohenlinden  Spears, 
the  twin  of  Brandywine,  the  paternal  Spears  hav 
ing  been  a  great  student  of  battles,  followed  in 
exhortation,  with  the  repeated  wish  that  his 
tongue  was  longer,  —  an  aspiration  so  imperfectly 
shared  in  his  behalf  by  his  hearers  that  they 
began  to  sing  him  down,  after  the  approved 
method  of  quelling  such  intruders ;  one  hymn- 
tune  after  another  being  quickly  raised  by  the 
chief  brethren,  the  deaf  sister  on  the  front  line 
of  seats  persistently  singing  them  all  in  her  own 
time,  and  generally  to  her  favorite  tune  of 
"  Bonnie  Doon,"  which  she  enriched  with  sun 
dry  luxurious  quavers.  At  the  height  of  the 
melody  a  newly  arrived  group  of  women  at 
tracted  the  hospitable  attention  of  Uncle  'Sias. 

"  This  way,"  he  hoarsely  whispered,  beckon 
ing  from  the  door  of  the  parlor-bedroom  to  the 
sisters,  who  evidently  could  see  but  little  beyond 
the  range  of  their  imprisoning  sunbonnets ;  and 
as  they  hesitated  at  noticing  the  seated  occu 
pants  of  the  room,  he  added,  explanatorily, 
"  seats  on  the  edge  o'  the  bed."  This  somno 
lent  invitation  was  gratefully  accepted,  and  the 
log-cabin  sunbonnets  filed  in,  and  took  up  their 
places  among  the  stuffy  pillows,  just  as  the 
singers  in  the  outer  room  were  raising  the 
tune,  — 


128  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"Shell  /be  kerned  toe  the  skies 
On  flowery  beds  of  ease  ?  " 

The  bed  had  not  been  unoccupied  through 
the  evening.  For  twenty  years,  or  for  half  her 
life,  it  had  been  the  habitat  of  Uncle  'Sias's  un 
happy  daughter,  Luce.  Jilted,  or,  as  her  people 
said,  "  shabbed,"  by  the  young  man  whom  she 
was  to  have  married,  she  never  held  up  her 
head  again  after  the  shock  of  this  misfortune, 
and  took  her  bed,  which  she  had  never  since 
left,  —  living  there  "  as  if  it  belonged  to  her  or 
ganism,"  and  finally  sinking  into  such  a  hapless 
state  that  for  years  past  her  mental  obituary 
might  have  been  read  in  that  line  of  the 
thoughtful  poet  of  rustic  life,  — 

"  She  slowly  withered,  an  imbecile  mind." 

By  one  of  those  coincidences  that  cease  to 
surprise  us  by  the  time  that  middle  age  has 
shown  us  how  often  they  recur  in  obedience 
to  some  mysterious  law,  the  company  of  that 
night  happened  to  include  another  of  the  weak- 
hearted  cravens  in  life's  warfare* —  a  man  of  ma 
ture  years,  who  had  never  been  heard  to  speak 
since  the  blow  fell  that  crushed  the  pride,  the 
hopes,  and  the  affections  of  his  early  manhood. 
No  force  of  entreaties,  taunts,  or  provocations 
could  drag  him  from  the  refuge  of  silence,  which 
he  had  sought  with  a  sternness  of  purpose  that, 
like  the  woman's  pitiful  cowering  away  from 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE  'SIAS'S.      129 

human  eyes,  testified  to  the  narrow  conditions 
and  imperfect  development  of  lives  that  went 
to  wreck  in  the  first  storm  of  disaster  by  which 
they  were  overtaken. 

The  meeting  was  conducted  in  the  usual  way. 
The  customary  appeals  were  made  from  the  lead 
ers  to  the  more  timid  sisters,  and  to  the  young 
converts,  to  rise  and  speak;  and  the  responses 
from  each  class  were,  in  most  instances,  of  an 
inaudible  brevity.  The  maturer  standard-bear 
ers  rose  and  delivered  the  set  speeches  with 
which  they  always  graced  these  occasions  ;  their 
several  styles  being  marked  by  the  repetition  of 
certain  texts  to  which  they  had  acquired  a  well- 
defined  right,  —  sacred  quotations  that,  as  was 
said  of  Emerson's  prose  "  't  is,"  became  almost 
a  personal  possession.  For  instance,  the  trade 
mark  distinguishing  Aunt  Rooty,  the  gatherer 
and  compounder  of  simples,  the  Medea  of 
savory  and  medicinal  drinks,  was  the  text,  "  Oh, 
taste  and  see  how  good  the  Lord  is  !  "  which  she 
dwelt  upon  with  a  sort  of  professional  unction, 
as  though  she  were  offering  some  ptisan  of 
sovereign  virtue.  And  Miss  Experience,  or 
'Speedy  Goodspeed,  known  for  her  painful  and 
halting  utterance,  never  failed  to  wind  up  her 
remarks  with  the  query,  "  What  shall  be  done 
unto  thee,  O  thou  false  tongue?"  Then  there 
was  the  usual  burst  of  gratitude  from  the  "  skinch- 
ing,"  or  miserly  Deacon  Handy,  who  piously 
9 


130  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

thanked  the  Lord  that  he  had  been  saved  from 
dead  works,  and  whose  hopes  of  justification 
must  indeed,  according  to  the  testimony  of  his 
neighbors,  have  rested  upon  faith  alone.  The 
usual  element  of  comedy  was  furnished  by  the 
flighty  speaker,  a  sister  of  infirm  wits,  but 
pious  intentions,  much  given  to  raising  her  voice 
in  a  high,  cracked  tone,  and  detailing  her  do 
mestic  trials  with  injudicious  frankness,  closing 
with  the  application  of  her  favorite  "  varse  "  to  her 
house-mates,  "  And  five  of  them  were  foolish." 
Her  example  encouraged  "Eelly  Dick,"  the  feeble 
minded  pauper,  whose  board  the  town  had  let 
out  to  Uncle  'Sias  as  the  lowest  bidder,  to  make 
his  first  appearance  on  any  religious  platform, — 
getting  slightly  astray  in  his  attempted  citation, 
"  A  woman  took  a  maysure  of  oil,  and  hid  it  in 
in  a  maysure  of  wheat,  until  the  whole  was 
leavened,"  but  meeting  the  Elder's  frown  with 
a  manly  independence,  by  the  declaration,  "  I 
may  not  repeat  it  as  verbatim  as  some,  but  it  is 
not  for  this  one,  nor  that  one,  nor  the  other  one 
to  say  what  I  shall  say  in  the  great  congrega 
tion  !  "  The  Elder  urged,  warned,  and  ex 
horted,  addressing  the  doubters  and  inquirers, 
reminding  them  that  Satan  desired  to  have 
them,  and  was  there  among  them;  that  the 
spiritual  eye  might  plainly  discern  him  right 
down  there  by  the  stove ;  and  that  all  concerned 
should  make  haste  to  leave  so  dangerous  a 


EVENING  MEETING  AT  UNCLE   'SIAS'S.      131 

vicinity  for  the  haven  of  the  anxious  seats. 
A  pause  ensued,  of  appalling  length,  after  which 
a  sister  rose,  and  with  the  pious  intention  of  rub 
bing  in  the  Elder's  persuasions,  quoted  her  own 
experience  at  a  similar  crisis,  when  she  "  felt  as 
if  glue  could  n't  begin  to  hold  her  down  half  so 
fast  as  Satan  did ;  but  she  broke  away  from  all 
her  bad  feelings,  and  got  up  and  spoke,  and  felt 
quite  a  good  deal  better  for  spiting  old  Satan." 

Perhaps  these  appeals  might  have  met  with 
the  desired  response  if  the  attention  of  the 
young  people  had  not  been  divided  between 
ghostly  warnings  and  skyey  threatenings.  The 
rain,  which  had  been  so  long  gathering  in  force, 
was  now  preluded  by  keen  flashes  of  lightning, 
and  ominous  mutterings  of  thunder.  Seeing 
that  no  movement  was  made  by  the  objects  of 
the  recent  exhortations,  Uncle  'Sias  rose,  just  to 
occupy  the  time,  as  he  explained.  "  Alas,  alas," 
he  began,  with  his  highest  aim  at  a  conventional 
style,  "  there  was  a  time  of  blessed  news,  when 
the  Lord  did  marvels  amongst  us,  and  we 
should  rej'ice,  yea,  and  did  rej'ice.  But,  alas, 
the  gold  is  become  dim,  and  the  most  fine  gold 
is  changed.  Although  I  hope  the'  is  some 
movings  on  the  minds  of  some  few,  yit  the 
saints  air  not  so  zeelous  f'r  the  Lord's  cause  an' 
the  good  o'  souls  ez  they  was  in  times  past. 
Sin  doth  greedily  abound  amongst  us,  and  the 
love  of  many  waxes  cold,  for  which  the  Lord  is 


132  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

angered  '  with  a  great  anger.  Now  is  plantin' 
time,  in  a  worldly  way  o'  speakin',  but  ef  we 
fare  ez  we  desarve,  what  sorter  harvest  shell  we 
hev?  Brethring,  it'll  be  ez  it  was  in  times  I 
knowed  when  I  lived  up  to  Wcstfield,  on  Widdcr 
Bacon's  farm,  when  the  Lord  sent  His  armies  o' 
worms  to  cut  off  the  fruits  o'  the  airth.  Thet 
season  it  come  'round  so  thet  they  ez  expected 
fifty  bushels  did  n't  git  sca'cely  one.  Seth  Beebe 
was  one  of  our  gret  farmers  up  thet  way.  He 
sowed  fo'teen  acres  o'  new  ground,  an'  antici 
pated  on  a  gret  crop.  Wai,  he  plowed  it  up, 
an'  planted  it  with  corn.  Oh,  thet  we,  ez  a 
people,  rememberin'  these  jedgments  o'  times 
past,  should  beware  lest  they  be  let  loose  in  the 
land  agin.  Oh,  my  young  frien's  we  'm  all  a 
lookin'  ter  you.  Oh,  think  o'  the  famine  in 
Egypt;  think  o'  the  plagues  o'  the  land;  think 
o'  the  good-will  o'  the  burnin'  bush;  think  —  " 

But  here  the  worthy  man's  words  were  lost 
in  the  fierce  rush  of  the  gust,  the  roll  of  the 
thunder,  and  the  maddened  lashing  of  the  rain. 
Hysterical  women,  whose  twitching  shoulders 
and  quivering  chins  had  for  the  last  quarter  of 
an  hour  betrayed  their  nervous  agitation,  cov 
ered  their  faces  before  the  blue,  blinding  lights 
that  glared  pitilessly  in  at  the  great  uncur 
tained  windows  of  the  old  farmhouse,  and  sobbed 
in  the  abject  misery  of  terror.  Stout-hearted 
Aunt  Freelove  was  heard  declaring,  "  Kind  of  an 


EVENING   MEETING  AT  UNCLE    'SIAS'S.      133 

onseasonable  sorter  thunder-tempest,  but  I  guess 
I  c'n  weather  it  tell  the  sullar  walls  ketches  fire." 
But  Brandywine  Spears,  who  had  hitherto  sat  in 
the  seat  of  the  scorners,  beside  the  open  house 
door,  now  hastily  joined  the  inner  circle,  a  pallid 
and  crestfallen  Mephistopheles,  as  the  racking 
peals  shook  the  giant  timbers  of  the  room,  and 
the  furious  beating  of  the  rain  on  the  roof  was 
like  the  tramp  of  a  charging  host,  while  a  long, 
lurid  dazzle,  a  roar  that  seemed  to  fill  the  sky, 
and  the  sickening  sound  of  a  rending,  tearing 
concussion  proclaimed  that  one  of  the  trees  of 
the  surrounding  forest  had  fallen.  Suddenly, 
at  this  crisis  of  awe,  the  mood  of  the  people 
passed  at  once  from  the  ecstacy  of  fear  to  the 
ecstacy  of  devotion ;  a  change  effected  by  the 
sign  and  voice  of  one  among  them  who  now 
assumed  the  place  of  a  leader.  At  the  signal 
of  this  strange,  tall  hermit  figure,  known  as  the 
solitary  dweller  in  the  centre  of  the  haunted 
Carr's  Plain,  they  rose  by  one  impulse  to  their 
feet,  and  poured  out  their  swelling  hearts  in  a 
wild  burst  of  sacred  song,  their  voices  mounting 
high  in  the  passionate  cry  of  the  triumphant 
refrain,  — 

"  Oh,  Moses  smote  the  waters, 
And  the  seas  gave  way  !  " 

With  the  singing  of  the  hymn  the  tempest 
somewhat  abated,  as  if  to  the  clang  of  mediaeval 
bells.  Angry  black  clouds  still  rose  fast  from 


134  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

the  ocean,  but  the  lightning  glanced  harmlessly 
through  the  protecting  veil  of  falling  waters,  and 
the  house  seemed  an  ark  of  safety  in  the  midst 
of  the  raging  floods.  All  looks  now  turned 
upon  the  new  guide  of  the.  evening's  devotions, 
as  he  remained  standing  in  his  place,  with  the 
abstracted  look  of  a  solitary,  and  yet  as  if 
charged  with  the  burden  of  a  word  that  must 
make  its  way  to  utterance.  Unknown  and  al 
most  nameless  as  he  was  to  the  listening  crowd, 
there  was  a  power  in  his  presence,  in  the  sug 
gestions  of  his  emaciated  countenance  and  the 
spectral  glitter  of  his  eye,  which  pointed  to  a 
reality  in  the  vague  background  of  rumor  which 
had  given  him,  at  his  coming  to  live  in  their 
community,  the  repute  of  a  seer  of  strange  vis 
ions,  and  of  a  fearless  host  to  such  ghostly  visi 
tants  as  the  inhabitants  of  the  haunted  territory 
which  he  had  chosen  to  make  his  dwelling- 
place.  But  if  a  suspicion  of  something  un 
hallowed  had  at  first  clung  to  his  mysterious 
personality,  it  disappeared  with  that  fuller 
knowledge  of  his  brooding  enthusiasm,  his 
meditative  insight,  and  his  recondite  learning 
Which  had  gained  him  his  common  title  of 
"The  Preacher,"  though  his  voice  had  never 
yet  been  heard  in  these  seasons  of  worship.  A 
lonely  settler  in  strange  places,  like  the  spiritual 
fathers  of  Rhode  Island,  — Williams,  Blackstone, 
and  Gorton,  —  it  was  rumored  that  he,  too, 


EVENING   MEETING  AT   UNCLE   'SIAS'S.      135 

claimed  to  be  a  witness  to  a  special  interpre 
tation  of  sacred  truths,  and,  like  those  historic 
pioneers,  had  been  separated  by  the  stress  of 
conflicting  opinions  from  his  earlier  associates, 
or,  as  it  was  more  darkly  hinted,  had,  at  the 
Divine  pleasure,  as  made  known  to  him  in  a 
dream,  left  home  and  family  and  friends  to 
dedicate  himself  to  the  contemplative  life. 

Such  were  the  confused  ideas  prevailing 
among  the  congregation  concerning  the  strange 
recluse  who  now  spoke  to  them,  wearing  a  far 
away,  introverted  look,  which  presently  quick 
ened  and  glowed,  as  his  low  and  quiet  tones 
grew  in  intensity  with  the  development  of  his 
theme. 

"  It  is  written,"  he  said,  without  preamble  or 
address,  "  in  the  Word  of  God  that  in  the  last 
days  He  will  pour  out  His  spirit  upon  His  ser 
vants  and  hand-maidens,  and  old  men  shall 
dream  dreams,  and  young  men  shall  see  visions. 
I  had  been  writing  a  letter  to  a  friend  at  a  dis 
tance,  and  being  weak  and  feeble,  I  lay  down  on 
my  bed,  with  my  face  toward  the  wall,  to  take 
repose,  and  soon  fell  into  a  sound  sleep.  Me- 
thought  I  cast  my  eyes  toward  heaven,  and  saw 
the  blue  vault  of  heaven  split  asunder,  through 
which,  I  thought,  I  saw  a  stream  of  light  and 
love  proceeding  from  the  throne  of  God,  clear 
as  crystal.  As  the  rays  of  the  sun  in  the  firma 
ment,  at  its  first  rising,  shine  into  a  door  or 


136  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

window,  so  that  the  stream  through  the  whole 
house  will  be  lighter  than  anywhere  else,  so  the 
whole  stream  of  light  from  heaven  to  where  I 
stood  shined  with  light  and  love." 

The  storm  was  subsiding,  and  the  flashes  of 
lightning  were  few  and  distant,  faintly  illumi 
nating  the  horizon.  The  dreaming  glances  of 
the  speaker  wandered  out  upon  the  night,  and 
returned  kindled  with  a  deeper  light,  as  he 
offered  a  newly-suggested  image  to  his  rapt 
listeners. 

"  Never  did  I  see  anything  so  straight,  and  on 
either  side  the  stream  was  decked  with  thou 
sands  of  little  rays  of  light,  all  pointing  one  way, 
even  toward  heaven.  I  thought  that  every  drop 
of  light  and  love  that  God  bestows  is  to  be  re 
turned  to  Him  again ;  and  while  I  stood  won 
dering  at  the  sight,  I  thought  I  saw  the  fiery 
chariot  of  God's  love  come  through  the  gap 
that  was  in  the  vault,  coming  through  the  midst 
of  the  stream,  a  hundred  times  swifter  than  I 
ever  saw  an  eagle  fly.  I  thought  it  was  all  over 
glorious,  and  in  color  like  to  a  rainbow,  and  was 
carried  on  wings  of  love.  In  a  few  moments  it 
was  just  by  where  I  stood,  and  turned  short 
about,  with  the  fire  part  toward  heaven,  and 
rested  on  its  wings,  keeping  its  wings  in  a  slow 
motion  to  bear  it  up,  and  waiting  for  me  to 
come  in.  I  thought  my  soul  was  transported ; 
I  thought  I  stood  with  my  heart  and  hands 


EVENING   MEETING  AT   UNCLE   'SIAS'S.       1 


3  7 


extended  to  heaven,  crying,  Glory,  glory  in  the 
highest  !  and  just  as  I  was  about  to  mount  into 
the  chariot  I  turned  to  a  great  multitude,  cry 
ing,  Glory,  glory,  I  am  going  to  glory  in  the 
fiery  chariot  of  His  love  !  and  with  these  words 
on  my  lips  I  awoke  out  of  sleep.  Oh,  cried  I, 
in  tears,  that  I  had  been  suffered  to  take  my 
flight  !  Oh,  thought  I,  in  the  bitter  disappoint 
ment  of  those  waking  moments,  if  one  view  of 
glory  and  love  will  fill  a  soul  with  such  joy,  even 
in  a  dream,  what  will  the  open  vision  and  full 
fruition  be  in  glory?" 

The  preacher's  voice  broke  and  failed,  the 
light  died  out  of  his  wan  face,  his  Dantean 
vision  was  told,  his  mission  was  ended.  The 
message  that  he  had  delivered  was  in  a  tone 
of  fervor  and  power  so  far  above  the  usual  spir 
itual  ministrations  received  by  the  flock  that  a 
confused  sense  of  wonder  sat  upon  all  the  faces. 
But  the  Elder,  or  exhorter  of  the  evening,  catch 
ing  something  of  the  enthusiast's  emotion,  dis 
missed  them  with  the  genuine  dignity  of  a 
pastoral  guide. 

"  Brethren,"  said  he,  "  our  brother  has  spoke 
to  us  in  the  word  of  power.  As  we  go  to  our 
homes,  and  lay  us  down  to  rest,  let  us  meditate 
well  thereupon;  and  let  each  one  commune 
with  his  own  heart,  and  be  still."  And  he  gave, 
and  the  congregation  received,  a  blessing,  with 
a  new  sense  of  reverence. 


138  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

As  the  people  disappeared  on  their  homeward 
ways  the  sky  was  still  obscured  by  drifting  fog, 
through  which  glimpses  of  the  clear  heavens, 
set  with'  star-points,  promised  a  further  April 
change  to  fair  weather.  But  the  atmosphere  of 
storm  and  cloud  and  mist  has  ever  since  hung 
so  heavily  over  the  story  of  that  night  that  it 
has  finally  come  to  wear  the  shadowy  shape  of 
a  legend  of  the  South  County. 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK. 

LOUISA,  Mrs.  Gould's  young  daughter,  was 
ailing  with  an  indisposition  that  had  not  as 
yet  assumed  any  definite  form,  though  some  of 
her  symptoms  were  thought  to  point  to  lung 
fever,  or  "  side-anguish." 

The  invalid  was  not  left  to  pine  in  solitude. 
In  the  kitchen-bedroom,  which  she  temporarily 
occupied,  were  her  aunt,  old  Miss  Esther,  or 
Eesther  Gould,  Friend  Mahala  Clark,  otherwise 
"Cousin  M'hal',"  who  was  neighboring  with  them 
for  the  day,  and  whose  distant  relationship  was 
made  the  means  of  a  compromise  between  a 
"  Friendly"  and  a  worldly  form  of  addressing  a 
person  of  years  and  dignity,  —  with  the  juvenile 
Gid  Gould,  whom  a  sprained  ankle  detained  at 
home,  and  who  resorted  to  his  sister's  room  in 
restless  search  after  some  acceptable  indoor  en 
tertainment.  Added  to  these  sources  of  com 
panionship  was  the  near  presence  of  several 
children  of  the  village,  who  had  gathered  in  the 
door-yard,  and,  surrounding  one  of  their  number 
placed  in  the  centre  of  the  circle,  were  shouting 
at  her  the  rhymed  salutation  of  their  game,  — 


140  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"Queen  Anne,  Queen  Anne,  she  sits  in  the  sun, 
As  fair  as  a  lady,  as  bright  as  a  nun." 

In  the  intervals  of  their  song  some  anony 
mous  crying,  which  might  safely  be  credited 
to  one  at  least  of  the  five  babies  in  the  imme 
diate  neighborhood,  was  pleasantly  borne  on 
the  breeze,  or  the  frail  and  precarious  pipe  of 
a  solitary  fowl,  just  under  the  sick-room  win 
dow,  made  itself  hoarsely  heard,  in  the  gloomy 
monosyllable  "  kurk,"  or  the  prolonged  groan 
"  Viur-ruck,"  uttered  with  a  moving  melancholy 
that  might  well  make  converts  to  the  Pytha 
gorean  doctrine  expounded  by  the  clown  in 
"  Twelfth  Night,"  that  the  soul  of  our  grandam 
might  haply  inhabit  a  bird,  and  convince  them 
that  this  pathetic  Dame  Partlet  was  the  identical 
fowl. 

"  I  do  b'lieve  that  faowl's  hungry,"  was  Aunt 
Eesther's  more  practical  interpretation  of  a  few 
notes  of  this  mournful  music;  "she  never  come 
round  when  the  rest  on  'em  was  fed,  f'r  I  see 
her  a-sottin'  thiar  all  the  time.  Gid,  jest  you 
shell  out  a  han'ful  o'  them  ears  a-hangin'  up 
thiar.  Here,  coop,  coop,  coop  !  Good  land  ! 
how  the  cretur  dooz  gaffle  it  down  I  "  cackled 
the  good  old  dame,  whose  voice  and  laugh  were 
as  quaintly  thin  and  sharp  as  the  vibrant  shrilling 
of  insects. 

Aunt  Eesther  repaired  the  ravages  of  age  by 
the  friendly  aid  of  a  cap  and  a  black  "  foretop," 


V 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  141 

over  which  she  oddly  wore  the  brown  satin 
s^nood  of  her  youth,  on  the  principle  that  it 
was  as  good  as  ever  it  was,  and  had  ought  to 
be  wore  out.  Her  scant  gown  and  the  little 
shawl  she  had  crossed  over  her  chest  assimi 
lated  her  general  appearance  to  that  of  Friend 
Clark  ;  but  the  latter  was  neater,  nicer,  and  wore 
her  plain  gown  with  a  sort  of  refined  rusticity. 
The  lappets  of  her  clear-starched  cap,  of  "sheer" 
muslin,  fell  to  her  shoulders,  and  her  spectacles 
shed  benevolent  lights  as  they  mildly  beamed 
on  the  invalid. 

The  latter  was  a  delicate  girl  of  twenty,  of 
the  usual  transitory  type  of  pale  prettiness  so 
often  seen  in  the  homes  and  schools  of  New 
England.  She  had  the  softness  and  freshness 
of  contour  and  complexion  that  make  the  in 
evitable  beauty  of  youth,  always  so  lightly 
regarded  by  its  possessor,  and  never  appre 
ciated  until  regretted.  But  she  had  not  the 
grace  of  youth,  for  her  thin,  tall  figure,  and 
high  shoulders,  gave  her  an  invalid  look,  even 
in  her  firmest  health.  Now,  however,  as  she 
rested  against  the  folds  of  the  coarse,  brown 
cottons,  which  many  washings  had  partially 
bleached  and  softened  from  their  first  crude 
estate,  her  dark  hair  and  eyes,  and  her  clear- 
toned  coloring  assumed  their  full  value;  and 
her  looks,  if  they  had  been  cheerful,  would 
have  been  of  supreme  charm ;  for  her  fever 


• 


142  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

was  as  yet  only  of  that  incipient  type  which 
brightens  the  eye  and  flushes  the  cheek  with  a 
hectic  counterfeit  of  the  triumph  of  high  health. 

"  Don't  ye  feel  now  ez  ef  ye  could  n't  eat  no 
dinner,  Loweyezy?"  questioned  her  aunt  with 
unintentional  ambiguity. 

"  The'  was  fowl-pie,  with  quohogs  in  it  f'r 
dinner,"  volunteered  Gid,  with  appropriate 
enthusiasm. 

"  Could  n't  thee  eat  some  of  the  bread-kind, 
Leeweeza?"  benevolently  queried  Friend  Clark. 

The  invalid  declined  this  cereal  feast,  and 
with  the  restlessness  of  increasing  fever,  turned 
impatiently  in  bed. 

"  Here  comes  the  Clacksum  girls,"  pro 
claimed  Aunt  Eesther  with  animation.  "  Now 
thet's  fort'nit ;  like  ez  not  they  'm  brung  ye 
some  relish  f'r  y'r  supper.  They  ain't  never 
killed  yit, —  it's  too  airly  yit  awhile  ter  be  tryin" 
out  leaf  lard,  —  but  some  hog's  pluck  is  jest 
what  folks  kinder  wants  now,  ain't  it?  Some 
liver,  now,  — " 

"  Eat  the  liver,  live  forever ; 
Eat  the  lights,  die  to  rights," 

vociferated  Gid,  flinging  himself  on  his  sister's 
bed,  as  the  guests  entered. 

The  three  Clacksum  girls,  Phyluty,  Pashe 
(from  Patience),  and  Osey  (or  Osianna),  be 
longed  to  that  numerous  class  whose  girlhood 
is  prolonged  by  a  fashion  of  speech  to  the 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK.  143 

furthest  possible  point.  But  they  must  be  ac 
quitted  of  any  intention  to  profit  by  this  benefit 
of  courtesy,  for  Phyluty,  always  the  spokes 
woman  of  the  group,  addressing  the  sick  girl 
in  a  loud  voice,  and  with  a  lively  sniff,  both  well 
adapted  to  cheer  her  depressed  spirits,  informed 
her  "  that  she  'd  haf  to  get  well  right  away  now, 
sence  the  old  maids  had  got  round  to  see  her  at 
last."  This  humorous  description  of  herself 
was  Phyluty's  perennial  joke,  and  her  acquaint 
ances  were  expected  to  find  perpetual  mirth  in 
it.  Having  been  in  the  habit  of  steadily  regard 
ing  it,  for  the  last  twenty  years  and  more,  as  an 
excellent  merry  jest,  she  seemed  now  either  to 
ignore  or  to  forget  the  more  serious  aspects  of 
the  case,  as  it  presented  itself  to  an  observer; 
so  that  she  afforded  an  instructive  instance  of 
that  curious  tendency  of  the  individual  to  make 
light  of  the  supposed  privations  of  humanity; 
for  nothing  is  more  common  than  to  hear  the 
solitary,  the  childless,  the  sickly,  and  the  aged 
jesting  at  their  condition  in  life,  not,  with  simple 
folk,  from  any  definite  motive  of  pride  or  self- 
assertion,  but  from  a  confused,  instinctive 
prompting  toward  adjustment  to  one's  environ 
ment.  And  even  among  people  of  a  more 
complex  self-  consciousness,  you  shall  hear 
women  making  sprightly  allusions  to  their  old- 
maidhood,  and  men  dwelling  with  humorous 
touches  upon  their  advancing  years,  seemingly 


144  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

unaware  that,  to  the  mere  matter-of-fact  ob 
server,  both  subjects  have  long  passed  "the 
limits  of  becoming  mirth." 

Osey,  the  third  sister,  who  had  inherited  sun 
dry  peculiar  traits  that  differentiated  her  from 
the  commonplace  order  of  mind,  had  perfected 
an  ingenious  scheme  for  fastening  a  desperate 
clutch  upon  receding  Time;  and  by  always 
stating  her  age  at  an  advance  of  seven  years 
beyond  what  it  really  was,  enjoyed  the  question 
able  refreshment  of  being  called  quite  a  young- 
looking  woman  —  of  her  age. 

"  I  thought  I  'd  fetch  Leeweezy  some  dangle- 
berries,"  observed  Phyluty,  in  modest  reference 
to  the  contents  of  her  mysterious  little  basket. 
!>  Ye  see  they  'm  gittin'  ter  be  a  kind  of  a  sc'ace 
yarb  now,  an1  I  did  n't  know  but  what  they  'd 
taste  good  to  her." 

"  Loweyezy  don't  never  eat  'em,"  frankly  re 
sponded  Aunt  Eesther,  with  the  uncompromis 
ing  truthfulness  of  country  breeding,  "  but  we  'm 
obleeged  ter  ye,  jest  the  same." 

"  Well  now,  I  allers  was  a  gret  hand  f  r  sass 
out  o'  season,"  remarked  Pashe,  reflectively. 

"  Yes,"  agreed  Phyluty,  that  leading  lady  of 
the  social  comedy,  "  I  dono  's  you  reck'lect  the 
time  Pashe  had  a  poor  spell,  —  kind  of  a  fall 
fever,  —an'  the'  wa'n't  nothin'  't  she  took  a  no 
tion  t'  eat,  'nless  't  was  some  red  rozbries.  Well, 
we  didn't  say  nothin',  but  Osey,  she  scurried 


WATCHING   WITH   THE   SICK.  145 

round,  an'  't  las'  she  come  in  one  day  'n'  said  ter 
Pashe,  '  Which  hand  'II  you  take,  the  right  or  the 
left  ? '  '  Sho  ! '  says  Pashe,  •  't  ain't  red  rozbries, 
I  know;  red  rozbries  hes  abeout  subsided.' 
'  Well,  they  'm  very  good  eatin'  rozbries  anyway,' 
says  I,  « ef  they  ain't  so  harnsum  ez  the  airly 
ones ;  '  f  r  ye  see,  they  was  the  fall  kind.  An' 
Pashe  begun  ter  pick  up  right  away  after  that,  so 
't  she  never  missed  a  meal." 

Phyluty  concluded  her  narrative  with  an  ef 
fective  sniff.  This  mode  of  expression  was  one 
that  she  had  nearly  brought  to  perfection,  and 
there  were  few  notes  in  the  gamut  of  her  emo 
tions  that  could  not  be  rendered  by  some  modi 
fication  of  this  energetic  facial  action. 

The  invalid  again  moved  wearily  on  her  pil 
low,  and  Aunt  Eesther  hastened  to  smooth  its 
folds,  with  the  mild  reminder,  — 

"  Folks  could  n't  never  say  of  you,  Loweyezy 
ez  they  uster  say  of  Cousin  M'hal',  thet  she 
would  be  the  sickest  woman,  an'  yit  keep  the 
smoothest  bed-clothes,  't  ever  they  see." 

'  Thee  feels  distressed,  Leeweeza,"  said  Cousin 
M  hal ,  with  a  subdued  expression  of  kindliness 
answering  to  the  frank  smile  of  affection  which 
lights  up  the  unchastened  lineaments  of  the 
world's  people,  and  speaking  in  tones  steeped 
m  some  source  of  inexhaustible  calm,  "  but  thee 
will  learn,  as  thee  lives  along,  to  bear  pain  an' 

4-/-\  **4-i  1  *•   a 


tortur." 

10 


146  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"  Leeweezy's  Cousin  Rit  went  off  suddin,  to 
the  last,  didn't  she?"  plaintively  inquired  Osey, 
who  naturally  felt  the  propriety  of  confining  the 
conversation  strictly  to  edifying  sick-room  topics. 
"  You  an'  she  was  jest  of  an  age,  an'  you  was 
allers  very  great,  wa'n't  you,  Leeweezy?"  she 
pursued,  with  a  glance  at  the  bed ;  to  which 
statement  its  occupant  mutely  assented.  "  I 
uster  think  she  was  tougher  'n'  any  pitch-knot ; 
she  wa'n't  one  o'  the  kind  that  never  makes  old 
bones "  —  with  another  glance  at  the  invalid, 
"  not  ter  look  at  her,  she  wa'n't ;  an'  she  wa'n't 
one  o*  them  that  hes  sick  spells;  but  she  giv' 
way  all  ter  onct." 

Pashe  now  took  up  the  thread  of  conversation 
so  deftly  spun  by  the  sisters  three,  affirming 
that  she  "  never  see  no  poor  cretur  that  seemed 
to  take  things  so  patient  and  resigned  as  Ritty 
did.  She  told  Elder  Fowler  what  text  she  'd 
have  preached  from  when  he  buried  her,  and 
she  picked  out  all  of  her  bearers,  and  they  said 
she  seemed  real  distressed  for  fear  't  would  n't  be 
a  good  day  for  her  funeral,  after  she  'd  planned 
it  all  out  so.  They  said  she  was  a  beautiful 
planner  of  a  funeral." 

"  Yes ;  she  was  composed  in  her  mind,"  em 
phatically  pronounced  Phyluty,  with  a  meaning 
sniff;  "  she  was  a  beautiful  girl."  This  latter  trib 
ute  to  the  departed,  who  had  had  the  misfortune 
to  be  of  singular  personal  plainness,  was  of  course 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  147 

understood  to  refer  to  that  moral  loveliness 
which  affords  the  only  ideal  of  beauty  recog 
nized  in  the  rustic  colloquialisms  of  feminine 
New  England. 

"He  ain't  here,  is  he?"  inquired  Osey,  with 
apparent  irrelevance,  and  nodding  in  the  direc 
tion  of  Louisa. 

"No,"  hesitated  Aunt  Eesther,  with  the  awk 
wardness  of  a  person  totally  unused  to  practise 
reserve  on  any  topic ;  "  ye  see  "  —  hurriedly  — 
"  he  's  got  work  now,  way  off  to  Biscuit  City, 
an'  he  's  up  there  a  lathin',  an'  Loweyezy,  she  's 
come  home  to  her  own  folks,  ter  stay  a  spell. 
I  expect,  though,  she  misses  her  ma,  now  she  's 
took  sick." 

"  Mis'  Gould  hes  gone  to  her  sister's,  ain't 
she?  "  continued  the  anxious  inquirer. 

"Yes,  ye  know  she's  got  a  young  baby,  an' 
her  hands  is  tied,  so  't  she 's  all  behind  with 
her  work,  an'  she  begun  ter  shake  in  her  shoes 
fer  fear  she  would  n't  be  through  house-cleanin' 
afore  the  thrashers  come.  An'  then  they  'd  haf 
ter  kill  next,  an'  nobody  but  her  ter  do  a  hand's 
turn,  an'  she 's  all  overdone  with  ev'rything 
hangin'  by  the  eyelids  so." 

Osey  opined  that  she  must  have  just  about  as 
much  as  she  could  fly  under;  and,  after  a  few 
further  expressions  ,of  neighborly  interest,  and 
not  a  few  tokens  of  neighborly  inquisitiveness, 
the  sisters  rose,  apparently  to  go,  but  really,  as 


148  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

it  proved,  to  stand  for  the  space  of  some  long 
minutes,  while  Pashe,  who  had  just  bethought 
herself  of  a  sovereign  charm  against  illness,  re 
lated,  with  some  assistance  from  Osey,  chiefly 
bestowed  in  the  form  of  vigorous  corrections  of 
her  narrative,  the  process  of  cutting  off  a  lock 
of  a  sick  person's  hair  in  the  increase  of  the 
moon,  and  pinning  it  to  the  wall,  so  that  the 
moonlight  should  rest  on  it  every  night  for  a 
week,  after  which  time  the  invalid  would  begin 
to  improve;  though,  to  be  sure,  as  she  con 
cluded,  there  was  n't  no  moon  just  now.  Phyluty 
was  reminded  of  a  case  in  which  this  spell  had 
worked  marvels,  and  proceeded  to  relate  it ;  but 
in  so  doing,  plunged  into  the  intricacies  of  a  col 
loquial  labyrinth,  wherein  panting  print  would 
toil  after  her  in  vain.  Speech  alone  could  repro 
duce  the  repeated  "  s'e  "  for  "  said  he,"  or  "  said 
she,"  and  "  s'l  "  for  "  said  I,"  with  the  other  frac 
tional  currency  of  social  exchange  which  she 
tendered  in  such  profusion  that  her  sisters  were 
fain  to  admonish  her  that  her  tongue  "  run  like  a 
ginger-mill."  But  at  last  they  buzzed  themselves 
away,  as  flies  will  finally  go  out  of  an  open 
door. 

"  'Bijah  !  "  called  Aunt  Eesther  to  a  slouching, 
shabby  man,  furtively  lounging  by,  "  now  while 
I  think  on  't,  jest  you  fetch  a  pail  o'  water." 

"  Ef  the  Mississippi  River  run  through  this 
house  't  would  n't  bring  water  enough  ter  satisfy 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  149 

the  durned  women-folks,"  growled  the  man ;  but 
he  finally  retraced  his  steps,  with  ostentatious 
dilatoriness,  to  do  the  hated  service. 

'Bijah  Fry,  Mrs.  Gould's  disreputable  brother, 
who  "  made  his  home  "  with  her,  or  was  toler 
ated  as  an  unwelcome  housemate  during  the 
tedious  intervals  between  his  precarious  "jobs," 
had  long  cherished  a  jealous  grudge  against 
harmless  Aunt  Eesther,  both  as  the  helpful  and 
valued  dependent  of  the  two  inmates  of  the  fam 
ily,  and  as  the  energetic  contriver  of  "  chores  " 
and  "  arrants,"  the  execution  of  which  fell  to 
him.  He  was  not  the  less  irritable  for  having 
but  lately  returned  from  a  prolonged  "  clam 
ming "  with  sundry  associates  whose  habits  were 
well  known  to  be  more  convivial  than  industrial. 
As  he  again  passed  the  window  Aunt  Eesther 
put  out  her  head  and  quavered,  — 

11  Where  be  ye  a-goin'  now,  'Bijah?  "  bringing 
him  face  to  face  with  her  as  he  snapped,  — 

"  Right  straight  to [they  did  n't  say  sheol 

then],  Eest' ;  don't  yer  wanter  send  an  arrant?  " 

"  Ef  the'  was  any  shame  in  ye,  'Bijah  Fry, 
yer'd  be  ashamed  ter  gin  sech  an'  arnswerwhen 
I  wanted  ye  ter  fetch  the  doctor,"  returned  the 
indignant  old  lady,  femininely  oblivious  of  the 
fact  that  her  purpose  had  remained  undeveloped. 

"Why  did  n't  ye  say  so,  then?"  angrily 
sneered  her  quasi  brother-in-law,  with  a  disgust 
that  equalled  her  own.  "  I  'd  a  done  it  for  her," 


150  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

he  added,  with  a  touch  of  genuine  concern  in 
his  manner,  as  he  looked  in  at  the  sick  girl. 
"I'll  do  it  willin'ly,"  he  loudly  resumed,  with 
swelling  dignity,  and  indulging  in  a  gloating 
animosity,  "  f  r  any  poor  gal,  let  alone  my  own 
niece,  es  hes  got  the  misfortin'  ter  have  a  stiff- 
necked  lunkhead  f'r  a  husband,  a  reg'lar  she-boss 
f  r  a  mother-in-law,  an"  ole  Eesther  Gould  f  r  a 
miss." 

Louisa  looked  pained  by  this  rude  champion 
ship,  and  the  feverish  flush  mounted  to  her  fore 
head,  but  she  said  nothing. 

"  'Bijah  must  ha'  swallered  old  razors,  he 's 
so  mighty  sharp,"  scornfully  commented  Aunt 
Eesther. 

"  'Bijah,  thee  is  a  trial,"  sighed  the  Friend, 
looking  after  the  retreating  swagger  of  his  dis 
reputable  figure.  "  He  makes  me  think,"  she 
continued,  "  of  the  old  man  that  went  every 
where  asking  for  work,  and  praying  that  he 
might  not  find  it.  Did  thee  hear,  Eesther,  how 
he  come  over  the  other  day  when  I  was  busy 
with  my  molasses-quince,  doing  up  the  skins 
and  cores.  Thee  knows  the  deeper  in  his  cups 
'Bijah  gets  the  more  solemn-wayed  he  is,  and  he 
said  he  come  to  me  with  a  message  from  the 
Lord  to  convert  me  and  my  house  to  the  Metho 
dist  way.  His  coat-pockets  was  all  weighted 
down  with  Methodist  books  —  where  dooz  thee 
suppose  he  got  them?  —  and  don't  thee  think," 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  151 

pursued  the  Friend,  with  mild  protest,  "  he 
wanted  me  to  bring  him  all  of  Friends'  publica 
tions  that  brother  Amram  keeps  in  his  book- 
closet,  and  sit  down  and  listen  to  him  while  he 
read  out  loud,  and  compared  them  with  his 
books.  I  never  was  so  put  by,  and  I  told  him, 
'  Thy  zeal  is  not  according  to  knowledge,  'Bijah ; 
thee  pesters  me ;  '  but  just  then  husband  come 
in  and  got  him  to  go  up  to  the  lot  and  see  what 
he  thought  of  the  sick  colt;  for  thee  knows, 
Eesther,  'Bijah  used  to  be  a  man  of  good  judg 
ment,  and  a  forcible  man,  when  he  was  himself." 
"  No,  I  dono  's  I  ever  knowed  no  good  on 
him,"  replied  Aunt  Eesther,  with  pardonable 
resentment. 

"  Miss  Esther  Protester  was  sent  to  the  Queen, 
The  most  modish  young  lady  that  ever  was  seen," 

repeated  Gid,  who  was  occasionally  seized  with 

a  desire  to  take  part  in  the  social  exercise  of  the 

afternoon. 

"  Was  that  air  writ  about  you,  Aunt  Eesther?  " 
"  Lor',  no,  child,"  affably  returned  his  relative, 

"  but  I  Ve  heerd  it  amongst  the  old  folks  here, 

time  out  o'  mind." 

"  The 's    some   more   on   it,"    persisted    Gid, 

"  where  it  says,  — 

" '  Is  Miss  Esther  within,  or  is  she  without  ? 
No,  she  's  up  chamber,  a-walkin'  about.' " 

"  Yes,   yes,"    nodded    Aunt   Eesther,    "  I  Ve 


152  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

knowed  it  ever  sence    I  was   a   tecnty  tawnty 
gal." 

"Then  what's  that  other  one?"  continued 
Master  Gid,  charmed  to  find  his  overtures  re 
ceived  with  more  than  wonted  consideration, 
"you  know  thet  one  about  the  old  keow  — 

" '  What  kin  ye  do  with  the  old  keow's  hoof? 
'T  will  make  ez  good  a  shingle  ez  ever  teched  roof. 
What  kin  ye  do  with  the  old  keow's  head  ? 
'Twill  make  ez  good  an  oven  ez  ever  baked  bread  ; 
White  bread,  or  brown  bread,  or  any  sich  a  thing  — '  " 

"  Does  thee  like  thy  schooling,  Gid?  "  pleas 
antly  asked  Friend  Clark,  by  way  of  timely 
diversion. 

"  Like  't  well  'nough,  most  times,"  graciously 
replied  the  youth.  "  Frid'y  fortnits  is  the  wust 
on  it.  Makes  me  sick  ter  hear  the  girls  get  off" 
their  compositions.  Our  school 's  chock  full  o' 
nat'ral  fools  —  mostly  girls  —  "  generalized  the 
young  philosopher.  "  Ev'ry  one  on  'em  writes 
a  letter,  an'  ev'ry  one  on  'em  gets  up  jest  as 
mincin'  —  so  fashion,"  •  —  as  he  attempted  an 
illustration,  —  "an*  sweetens  up  her  voice,  an' 
reads  out,  'I  go  to  school  to  Miss  Ann  Scranton, 
which  I  like  ve-ry  much.'  "  Gid  mimicked  the 
small  girlish  pipe  with  impatient  disgust.  "  They 
don't  no  such  a  thing  !  They  don't  like  old  Ann 
Scran  any  better  'n  I  do." 

"Why  doozn't  thee  like  thy  kind  teacher?" 
gently  inquired  the  good  Friend. 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  153 

"  'Cause  she  wears  them  brass  thimbles  on 
her  ten  fingers,  an'  cracks  you  over  the  head 
when  you  ain't  lookin',"  promptly  explained  the 
youth. 

"  And  what  dooz  the  boys  say  in  their  let 
ters?"  further  queried  Friend  Clark,  abandoning 
the  defence  of  the  amiable  teacher. 

"  The  boys  don't  write,"  returned  Gid,  with 
contempt.  "  Them  's  f  r  girls.  The  boys  speaks 
pieces.  Si  Bently  hed  'The  Seasons,'  an' s'e, 
'Some  like  spring,  some  like  winter  best;  but 
ez  f  r  me,  give  me  libbaty  or  give  me  death !  ' 

"Was  thy  teacher  pleased  then?  " 

"  No ;  he  got  kep'  arter  school.  She  said 
'twas  too  short,"  Gid  added,  with  a  musing 
air. 

"  'Nother  time,"  he  resumed,  brightening  up, 
"  Si  got  up  ter  speak,  an'  s'e,  '  Friends,  Romans, 
Countrymen,  and  Lovers,  lend  me  yer  ears. 
Mother 's  gonter  bile  souse  ter-morrer,  an'  wants 
ter  git  all  she  kin.'  " 

"Did  thy  teacher  punish  him  for  such  wrong 
conduct?  " 

"  Guess  she  did,"  grinned  Gid,  with  retrospective 
delight.  Then,  interrupting  his  recital  of  the  trials 
of  this  unappreciated  humorist,  he  announced : 
"  Say,  I  b'lieve  I  c'n  make  out  ter  hobble  roun' 
some  now,"  and  disappeared  in  the  direction  of 
the  garret  stairs,  whence  he  presently  returned 
with  a  struggling  cat,  a  penknife,  and  a  large 


154  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

spool.  The  relations  between  these  three  ob 
jects  became  more  apparent  as  he  began  the 
process  of  shaving  the  tip  of  the  cat's  tail  in 
order  to  string  the  spool  firmly  upon  it. 

"Say,  Gid,  what  be  you  a-doin'?"  asked 
Louisa,  with  annoyance. 

"  Hey,  whossay?  "  automatically  replied  the 
youth,  whose  attention  was  anxipusly  centred 
upon  the  threatening  mews — not  loud,  but 
deep  —  of  the  afflicted  animal. 

"  I  say,  what  does  make  you  cruelize  that 
poor  dumb  cretur  so?"  repeated  his  sister  with 
invalid  fretfulness. 

"Wai,  't  ain't  ourn,"  answered  Gid,  convinc 
ingly.  "She's  a  wile-cat.  She  ain't  dumb, 
neither.  Wisht  she  was.  (Buhstill  thiar  !  can't 
ye  buhstill?)  Ketched  her  down't  the  brook 
when  I  was  lookin'  up  turkles.  Come  on  to  her 
all  cajunk.  She  scratched  'n*  sung  some,  same  's 
she  does  now  —  Scat !  ye  most  went  through 
my  thumb !  "  —  and  as  Gid  applied  that  in 
jured  member  to  his  mouth  puss  with  one  fran 
tic  effort  writhed  herself  from  his  grasp,  and  in 
a  single  leap  cleared  the  window ;  while  her  tor 
mentor  gazed  after  her  in  keen  disappointment. 

"  Uhdone,  Gideon  Gould  !  "  sternly  menaced 
Aunt  Eesther,  adding  the  mysterious  nautical 
threat,  "  Uhdone,  or  I  '11  cleave  ye  from  clue  ter 
earring !  Mr.  Pillsbury  's  comin'  in." 

After  this  manner  Aunt  Eesther,  like  others  of 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK.  155 

her  class,  commonly  described  and  addressed  a 
doctor. 

The  village  doctor  of  that  day  was  a  taciturn, 
routine-plodding  "  drugger,"  as  he  was  some 
times  not  inappropriately  called.  The  old  sad 
dle-bags  —  which  now  accompanied  him  in  his 
wagon,  since  he  no  longer  went  his  rounds  on 
horseback  —  were  loaded  to  bursting  with  the 
heaviest  ammunition  used  in  the  warfare  of  the 
medical  profession  with  the  insurgent  forces  of 
disease.  He  wore  a  wig  that  might  have  seen 
better  days  among  the  many  it  had  evidently 
known  ;  and  his  coat  was  as  splashed  and  stained 
with  traces  of  rough  riding  as  if  he  had  been  a 
king's  messenger.  The  old  white  steed  that  had 
made  many  roundabout  journeys  in  the  town 
ship,  and  which  had  partly  earned  for  his  rider 
the  title  of "  Death  on  the  Pale  Horse,"  stood 
contentedly  cropping  the  roadside  grass. 

Louisa  shrank  with  the  morbid  sensitiveness 
of  her  acutely  nervous  temperament  from  his 
business-like  look  and  touch ;  but  he  coolly  ig 
nored  his  patient,  addressing  most  of  his  inquiries 
to  her  aunt,  and  muttered  at  intervals  to  himself 
as  if  he  were  composing  an  incantation  where 
with  to  exorcise  the  evil  spirit  of  illness. 

"  Her  skin  feels  dreadful  fevery,  Doctor,"  ven 
tured  the  old  woman,  who  stood  anxiously  await 
ing  his  commands.  "  I  expect  she  's  overdone, 
an'  she  's  kep'  up  too  long.  Ye  see,  she  's  got 


156  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

too  much  resolution,  an'  so  she  's  run  down  all 
to  onct,  an' — " 

"  Sho,  nonsense  ! "  vouchsafed  the  great  man. 
"  She  needs  to  get  blooded,  that 's  all.  Bring 
me  the  bowl !  " 

Obedient  to  the  expected  mandate,  Aunt  Ees- 
ther  presently  returned,  bearing  the  bowl,  and 
looking  like  a  rustic  Muse  of  Tragedy ;  while  the 
Doctor,  quick  with  his  lancet,  opened  a  vein  in 
the  slender  arm  of  the  trembling  girl. 

"That'll  do,"  he  magisterially  announced, 
after  a  shorter  interval  of  silent  attention  than  was 
usually  allotted  to  this  familiar  form  of  surgery, 
speaking  in  a  tone  in  which  contempt  and  toler 
ation,  with  a  certain  relenting  toward  the  youth, 
sex,  and  nervous  distress  of  his  patient  were 
curiously  blended,  —  "  that 's  all,  Louisa.  Sha'n't 
bleed  her  much.  A  flea-bite  knocks  her  over. 
S'  got  no  staminy." 

With  this  frank  statement  the  Doctor  pro 
ceeded  to  portion  out  the  drugs  to  be  adminis 
tered  in  the  night,  and  was  leaving  with  the 
assurance  that  he  would  be  'round  in  the  morn 
ing,  when  Aunt  Eesther,  curiously  smelling  and 
tasting  one  of  the  doses,  must  needs  delay  him 
to  ask,  — 

"What's  this  here  you'm  gi'n  her,  Mr.  Pills- 
bury?  I  don't  seem  ter  make  't  out  egzac'ly." 

"  That  is  medicine,  marm !  "  shouted  the  en 
raged  physician  in  no  sick-room  voice. 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  157 

"  The  land,  Mr.  Pillsbury !  I  never  laid  out 
ter  affront  ye,"  began  Aunt  Eesther ;  but  he  was 
already  out  of  hearing. 

"  Deary  me !  "  panted  the  worthy  old  lady, 
"he's  dreadful  crickery,  ain't  he?  Loweyezy, 
how  d'  ye  feel  now?  Powerful  weak,  ain't  ye, 
arter  that  bleedin'?  Wai,  I  wisht  Cousin  M'hal' 
could  a  sot  with  ye  a  spell  longer;  but  she  tho't 
she  mus'  go  when 't  come  sunset. 

"  '  When  Darby  see  the  settin'  sun 
He  slung  his  sy',  an'  home  he  run,' " 

repeated  Aunt  Eesther,  who"  sometimes  adorned 
her  discourse  with  poetical  fragments. 

"  Lor',  you  uster  be  jest  crazy  to  hev  me  tell 
ye  them  varses  in  blindman's  holiday  same  's  't  is 
now.  My  poor  old  mem'ry  's  mos'  wore  out," 
she  continued  with  a  meek  show  of  depreciation 
that  decently  veiled  her  harmless  vanity;  "  but 
I  guess  I  could  worry  through  with  '  The  Three 
Warnin's.' " 

No  response  from  the  patient. 

"  Or  else,"  this  all-accomplished  nurse  vol 
unteered,  "  thiar  's  '  William  an'  Marg'ret,'  yer 

know. 

"  '  When  all  was  wrapt  in  dark  midnight, 

And  all  were  fast  asleep, 
In  glided  Margaret's  grimly  ghost, 
And  stood  at  William's  feet.'  " 

A  slight  movement  and  a  faint  sigh  of  weari 
ness  reached  Aunt  Eesther's  sympathetic  ear. 


158  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"Wai,  'tis  kinder  pokerish,"  she  admitted; 
"  an'  so  's  '  Alonzo  the  Brave  and  the  Fair  Imo- 
gene ;  '  but  you  allers  was  dreadful  fond  o' 
'  Barbry  Allen.' " 

And  Aunt  Eesther,  with  infinite  relish,  and 
rocking  back  and  forth  in  time  to  the  arbitrary 
emphasis  which  she  gave  to  sundry  words,  re 
peated,  — 

"In  Scarlet  town  where  I  was  born, 
There  was  a  fair  maid  dwelling, 
Made  every  youth  cry,  Wel-awaye  ! 
Her  name  was  Barbara  Allen." 

The  invalid  grew  restless  long  before  Her 
quaint  companion  had  reached  the  climax  of 
the  narrative, — 

"  He  turned  his  face  unto  the  wall 

As  deadly  pangs  he  fell  in  ; 
Adieu,  adieu,  adieu  to  all ! 
Adieu  to  Barbara  Allen  ! 

As  she  was  walking  o'er  the  fields 
She  heard  the  bells  a-knelling, 

And  every  stroke  did  seem  to  say, 
Unworthy  Barbara  Allen ! 

With  scornful  eye  she  looked  down, 

Her  cheek  with  laughter  swelling; 
Whilst  all  her  friends  cried  out  amain, 
Unworthy  Barbara  Allen  ! 

When  he  was  dead  and  laid  in  grave, 
Her  heart  was  struck  with  sorrow  ; 

O  mother,  mother,  make  my  bed, 
For  I  shall  die  to-morrow  ! 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK.  159 

Hard-hearted  creature  him  to  slight 

Who  love*d  me  so  dearly  ! 
O  that  I  had  been  more  kind 'to  him 

When  he  was  alive  and  near  me  ! 

She,  on  her  death-bed  as  she  lay, 
Begged  to  be  buried  by  him  "  — 

"  Don't,  Aunt  Eesther,  don't !  "  sobbed  the  girl 
with  a  sudden  violence  that  seemed  to  emanate 
from  some  deeper  source  of  emotion  than  physi 
cal  exhaustion  or  sympathy  with  the  grotesque 
sentiment  of  the  old  ballad  ;  then  struggling  hard 
for  self-control,  she  begged,  "  Please,  don't!  It 
makes  me  so  nervious !  " 

"  There,  there,  child !  "  patiently  responded 
the  kindly  old  dame.  "  Why  did  n't  ye  say  so 
afore?  My  pity!  yer  all  wore  out,  ain't  ye? 
There  now,  jest  yer  wait  tell  I  put  some  mus 
tard  drafts  ter  yer  feet  an'  gin  ye  some  o'  yer 
soothin'  mixtur',  an'  mebbe  ye  '11  feel  better." 

These  offices  concluded,  and  the  patient  lying 
still  in  a  sort  of  tense  quietude,  the  silence  of 
the  dimly-lighted  room  was  again  broken  by  a 
soft  though  measured  foot-fall,  and  the  subdued 
sound  of  a  kind  voice  asking  pleasantly,  "  How 
does  Leeweeze  seem  ter  be  now?  " 

"  Char/<?/te  Temple  !  "  exclaimed  the  old  lady, 
starting  up  from  her  doze,  and,  according  to  her 
custom,  addressing  the  welcome  guest,  Widow 
Wilson,  by  her  "  given  name  "  in  full,  "  I  'm  a 
thousan'  times  obleeged  ter  ye  fer  comin' !  I 


160  SOUTH -COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

tole  her  par  when  he  come  back  V  said  yer  'd 
be  here  ter-night  thet  I  was  bounden  tcr  ye  'nough 
sight.  I  expect  Loweyezy  's  be'n  frcttin'  her  head 
off  fer  ye  all  day.  I  dono  's  she  railly  needs  a 
watcher ;  but  yer  '11  be  comp'ny  f  r  her,  an' 
there's  lots  o'  med'cine  ter  give.  I'm  an  old 
woman,  Char/0/te,"  impressively  proclaimed 
Aunt  Eesther,  —  who  apparently  still  harbored 
that  subtle  conviction  which  dies  so  hard  in 
the  feminine  consciousness,  that  the  fact  of  age 
never  becomes  patent  to  observers  unless  duly 
announced,  —  "  an'  it  Stan's  to  reason  't  I  can't 
be  on  my  feet  night  'n'  day.  I  be'n  on  the  go 
sence  four  o'clock,  an'  I  'm  putty  well  wagged  ; 
'Bijah  he 's  be'n  a-tewin'  roun',  an'  Gid  he 's 
be'n  inter  mischief,  an'  I  arter  'em,  an'  when 
I  wrung  out  my  dish-clout  ter-night  I  was 
eenemost  ready  ter  drop." 

The  widow,  with  the  quiet  efficiency  of  experi 
ence,  began  looking  over  the  medicines. 

"  That 's  the  doze-powder,"  explained  Aunt 
Eesther. 

"  Dover's  powder,"  interjected  the  patient. 

"Wai,  Vs  all  one,  ain't  it?"  returned  the  aunt 
in  atone  of  quasi  injury.  "  Lor',  when  Loweyezy 's 
a  leetle  grain  crickery,  she  '11  grammarize  ev'ry 
word  't  I  speak !  An'  this  here 's  the  sweet 
nitre,  an'  this  stuff  in  the  cup,"  shaking  it  sus 
piciously —  "no,  I  dono  what't  is.  Mr.  Pills- 
bury  mos'  took  my  head  off  f  r  axin'  him  a  civil 


WATCHING  WITH  THE  SICK.  l6l 

question.  I  dono  what  ailded  him;  but  they 
say  he  was  a  dretful  crosspatch  when  he  was  a 
baby,  an'  I  guess  he  hain't  never  outgrowed  it. 
Wai,  good-night  ter  both  on  ye.  Guess  I  sh'll 
sleep  'thout  rockin'  ter-night.  Charfotte  [to  the 
widow,  who  had  followed  her  into  the  kitchen], 
I  'm  real  glad  yer  come ;  she  thinks  the  world  on 
ye ;  an'  I  'm  afeered  she 's  dretful  slim ;  she  wa'n't 
never  real  rugged.  Wai,  I  Ve  eenemost  watched 
myself!  It 's  nigh  on  ter  ten  o'clock  now!  " 

"  Yer  don't  look  so  dreadful  sick,  Leeweeze," 
said  Charlotte,  reassuringly,  on  her  return.  "I  Ve 
heard  tell  of  folks  thet  was  so  homely  they  hed 
ter  hev  watchers :  but  yer  don't  look  that  way." 

"  Oh,  Charlotte !  "  panted  the  suffering  girl, 
whose  fever  had  now  returned  with  violence ;  "  I 
do  feel  so  fevery !  Raise  me  up ;  give  me  a 
drink  o'  water." 

"  I  dursn't,  child,"  sorrowfully  replied  her 
friend.  "  The  doctor  said  yer  could  hev  some 
water,  —  a  teaspoonful  to  a  time.  Well,  there," 
as  her  patient's  distress  increased,  "I'll  resk  it 
f  r  yer  ter  drink  thet  much  in  the  cup  ;  but  yer 
be  a  good  girl,  an'  don't  ask  f'r  no  more  now. 
Poor  child  !  "  as  the  girl  fell  back  with  a  shud 
dering  sigh;  "yer  miss  y'r  mother,  an'  yer  miss 
Jim,  don't  yer?  " 

"  Oh,  Charlotte !  "  cried  the  sufferer  as  this 
firm  touch  probed  her  morbid    consciousness, 
"Yer  know  all  about  it,  then?" 
ii 


1 62  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"  I  know  nothin'  more  'n  I  see  when  I  come 
inter  this  room,"  returned  the  other.  "  I  see  y'r 
heart  was  full  quick  's  as  I  set  eyes  on  yer.  But 
don't  yer  talk  now;  yer  c'n  tell  me  some  other 
time,  an'  nef  yer  want  to." 

"  No ;  I  must,  I  must  tell  yer  now,"  cried  the 
young  creature,  wildly,  her  pent-up  passion  find 
ing  voice  at  last. 

"  Well,  I  don't  never  let  none  o'  my  sick  folks 
go  ter  talkin',"  hesitated  the  new  nurse,  divided 
in  judgment  as  to  her  patient's  most  pressing 
needs ;  then  yielding  to  the  appeal  that  looked 
so  cravingly  from  the  dark  eyes,  she  said,  "  Well, 
talk  a  little  while  ef  yer  want,  an*  then  mebbe 
yer  '11  sleep  better  when  yer  git  it  off  y'r  mind. 
Jest  yer  let  me  fix  the  clo'es  'round  ye  an' 
straighten  ye  out  a  little.  There,  there,  now," 
murmured  the  elder  woman  as  if  to  a  child,  tak 
ing  one  of  the  throbbing  wrists  between  her  cool, 
soothing  palms. 

"  Oh,  I  know  I  Ve  done  bad,"  began  the  girl, 
in  tearless  wretchedness,  "  but  it  all  begun  little 
by  little,  an'  who  would  thought  't  would  come 
ter  this  in  sca'cely  mor  'n  a  year's  time !  " 

"  Yer  mean  yer  an'  Jim  has  hed  fallin's 
out?"  quietly  asked  her  companion,  with  a 
penetration  that  astonished  the  inexperience 
of  the  younger  woman. 

"  Yes,  oh  yes ;  I  would  n't  care  about  no 
sickness  ef  only  I  felt  right  in  my  mind ;  but 


WATCHING   WITH   THE   SICK.  163 

I  expect  the  way  I  took  sick  in  the  first  place 
was  becos  I  worried  an'  cried  so." 

"  But  how  come  ye  ter  leave  yer  husband, 
Leeweeze?  Couldn't  ye  fix  things  right,  no 
way?  I  never  sh'd  tho't  yer'd  been  so  uppish 
that  yer  could  n't  get  along  with  folks." 

"  Oh,  I  could  n't  stan'  it  no  longer  with 
Mother  Flint,"  cried  the  girl,  with  an  air  of 
challenge.  "  Yer  don't  begin  ter  know  what 
she's  like.  She  's  a  reg'lar  born  scold.  Mebbe 
she  can't  help  it,  —  Jim  says  she  can't,  —  an' 
I  don't  wish  her  a  speck  o'  harm,  an'  ef  she 
was  sick  I'd  wait  on  her,  an'  tend  on  her;  but, 
Charlotte,  I  ain't  got  the  grace  ter  live  with 
her  day  in  an'  day  out.  She 's  dreadful  hard 
ter  live  with;  her  own  folks  says  so.  Her 
daughter  uster  get  so  worked  up  when  she 
was  ter  home  that  she  'd  fling  right  out  before 
the  neighbors,  an'  say,  'I  think  my  mother's 
the  worst  woman  in  the  world !  '  Ev'rybody 
says  she  fretted  Mr.  Flint  inter  his  grave,  an' 
how  could  I  expect  to  hold  up  my  sides  with 
her?  She  faulted  me  for  ev'rything  I  did,  an' 
ev'rything  I  did  n't  do,  tell  I  got  so  nervious 
I  was  fairly  'fraid  o'  the  shadder  o'  her  sun- 
bunnit  hangin'  up  against  the  wall." 

"  Sho,  Leeweeze,  that  was  real  silly." 

"  Well,  I  do  suppose  I  was  jest  the  worst  one 
to  hev  went  there;  I  wa'n't  one  thet  could 
give  her  back  ez  good  ez  I  got,  an'  yet  I  wa'n't 


1 64  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

one  o'  the  kind  ter  be  put  upon  an'  never  say 
Ah!  Yes?  nor  No!  I  wa'n't  real  patient  an' 
pleased  with  her,  —  I  dono  who  could  be, 
'nless  't  was  the  deef  'n'  dumb.  So  she  giv' 
me  no  peace,  tell  at  larst  I  got  ter  bein'  pretty 
nigh  ez  highstrung  ez  she  was,  an'  then  she 
was  sooted,  becos  she  could  leave  off  talkin1 
about  my  sulks,  an'  talk  about  niy  tempers. 
That  galled  Jim,  I  knew;  fer  he  could  n't 
never  enjure  women  thet  was  coarse-wayed 
and  tonguey.  I  s'pose  he  'd  hed  enough  of 
it  ter  home,  an'  he  liked  me  becos  he  thought 
I  was  quiet  an'  pretty-wayed.  Well,  thet 's  all 
over,  now.  And  then  they'd  always  made  a 
poppet  of  me,  here  ter  home,  an'  Ma  kep'  put- 
tin'  me  up  ter  things ;  an'  when  I  'd  tell  her 
how  I  fared  with  Mother  Flint,  she  'd  say  she  'd 
take  my  part,  ef  Jim  would  n't.  An'  thet  was 
ez  true  a  word  ez  ever  was  spoke ;  he  would  n't 
take  no  sides;  seemed  ter  think  my  troubles 
was  too  small  business  fer  him,  altogether.  He 
said  he  knew  enough  ter  keep  outer  all  women 
fights,  an'  it  made  me  feel  ill  towards  him  ter 
see  how  he  looked  down  on  me,  fer  complainin' 
the  least  mite.  .Ef  I  named  his  mother's  name 
ter  him,  it  madded  him,  an'  he  'd  say  he  mus' 
go  right  off  an'  weed  the  garding,  though  I 
knew  well  'nough  't  wa'n't  sufferin'.  Charlotte," 
she  turned  toward  her  companion,  seeking  her 
face  with  appealing  eyes,  "  do  you  b'lieve  any- 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  165 

body  ever  is  ez  good  ter  yer  ez  yer  own  folks 
be?  When  I  was  ter  home  my  folks  hed  feelin's 
fer  me,  an'  set  store  by  me,  right  along,  whether 
I  done  good  or  done  bad;  but  when  yer  go 
off  among  other  folks,  they  '11  only  treat  yer 
ez  well  ez  yer've  aimed  a  right  ter  be  treated, 
ef  they  do  thet.  But  I  feel  real  condemned 
ter  say  so,  too;  fer  Jim  was  kind  ez  could  be, 
most  o'  the  time,  and  he  uster  get  all  worked 
up  when  I  hed  my  bad  spells.  '  Now,  sis,'  he 
uster  tell  me,  '  you  must  hev  the  doctor,  right 
off/  —  an'  ther'  was  times  when  he  'd  lose  the 
heft  of  a  day's  work  goin'  fer  him  an'  gettin' 
back,  'sides  his  charges,  an'  never  say  a  word 
about  his  wife's  bein'  nothin'  but  a  bill  of  ex 
pense,  the  way  Squire  Stonan  does  about  his'n ; 
and  he  's  a  real  rich  man,  an'  rides  in  a  wagin, 
an'  hes  his  house  painted.  But  Jim  would  n't 
never  own  thet  't  was  his  mother's  hateful  ways 
thet  giv'  me  my  bad  headaches ;  he  always 
would  hev  it  thet  I'd  got  cold^or  else  I'd  et 
somethin'  thet  wa'n't  hulsome.  He  never  minds 
his  mother's  talk,  no  more  'n  the  wind  thet 
blows,  an'  he  could  n't  make  out  why  I  did. 
So,  whatever  I  'd  tell  him,  he  was  dreadful 
clus-mouthed,  an'  would  n't  take  no  notice,  no 
more  'n  ef  I  was  jest  a  mad  child.  Then  I  'd 
shet  myself  up  an'  cry  hours  to  a  time,  ter  think 
how  changed  he  was  to-wards  me ;  for  when  he 
was  goin'  with  me,  he  was  quick  enough  ter 


1 66  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

flare  up  if  anybody  laid  a  straw  in  my  path ; 
an'  when  he  took  a  notion  how  thct  or'nary 
Joe  Harkins  only  looked  kinder  onhandsome 
at  me,  he  follercd  him  afterwards,  —  so  the 
folks  told  me,  —  an'  took  him  ter  do  fer  it,  an' 
when  Joe  giv'  him  some  impidence,  Jim  told 
him,  '  You  mean  dog,  you,  I  '11  thrash  the 
ground  with  you  ! '  An'  he  did,  too." 

"  Don't  yer  realize  't  yer  '11  tire  yerself  allv 
out,  talkin'  this  rate?"  interposed  her  anxious 
listener. 

"  I  can't  stop  now,  Charlotte,"  pleaded  the 
sufferer,  with  a  restless  impatience  to  recite  the 
whole  unhappy  story  of  her  brief  wedded  life. 
"  I  was  all  overbecome  ter  fare  so  with  Jim, 
an'  did  n't  know  what  ter  make  of  it,  fer  I  'd 
never  thought  things  would  go  so  hard.  You 
know  well  'nough  how  't  is  with  Pa.  Pa  thinks 
Ma  made  the  world,  an'  everythin'  here  goes  jes' 
ez  she  says.  And  there 's  Uncle  Samson, — ef  he 
thinks  any  thoughts,  they'm  his  wife's  thoughts; 
an'  what  words  he  speaks  is  his  wife's  words; 
so  't  it's  real  ridic'lous  ter  hear  him  lay  down 
the  law,  when  you  know  all  the  time  it's  Aunt 
Sarah  Ann  jes'  makin'  a  mouthpiece  on  him ; 
fer  he  shets  his  eyes  an'  takes  her  jedgment 
right  along  in  everythin',  from  ridge-poles  ter 
cap-borders.  I  see  all  thet,  an'  course  I  thought, 
—  well,  I  s'pose  I  thought  I  sh'd  hev'  some 
infl'ence.  But  the  most  o'  women  finds  it  the 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  l6/ 

same,  I  guess;  love  don't  count  ter  men  folks 
ez  it  does  ter  us ;  it  ain't  anythin'  thet  comes 
inter  their  lives  an'  drives  ev'rythin'  else  out, 
ez  it  does  with  us  women.  Becos  a  man  loved 
me,  or  said  he  did,  I  tho't  'twas  kingdom 
come  on  airth,  an'  't  I  oughter  do  jest  ez  he 
said,  an'  so  I  went  ter  live  with  his  mother,  though 
I  knew  better  all  the  time.  But  it's  diff'rent 
with  a  man  somehow.  Ef  a  woman  loves  him, 
why  in  course  she  ought  ter,  —  does  it  becos  she 
wants  ter,  anyway.  He  don't  see  no  partic'lar 
meerit  ter  it,  an'  no  reason  't  all  why  he  sh'd  ever- 
lastin'ly  hear  ter  her  on  account  on' t.  Ef  she 
loves  him,  why  thet's  her  privilege;  he  ain't 
noways  obligated  by  it 

"  But  Jim  an'  me  got  along  well  enough,  in  a 
manner  o'  speakin' ;  fer  the'  is  times  when  pride 
Stan's  yer  best  friend,  an'  so  I  wa'n't  all  the  time 
hectorin'  of  him,  ez  I  hev  heard  women  doin', 
always  askin',  '  Say,  do  yer  love  me  ez  much  this 
Mond'y  mornin'  ez  yer  did  las'  Wednesd'y  after 
noon  ? '  or  full  ez  foolish  ez  thet.  I  always  was 
disgusted  with  it,  an'  I  could  be  contented  enough 
though  Jim  did  n't  make  no  gret  fuss  with  me,  so 
long  's  I  knew  't  was  jest  his  queer  way.  Mostly 
'twas  kinder  in  joke  ef  he  noticed  me  an'  made 
much  o'  me ;  fer  course  he  was  jest  like  all  the 
men  folks,  forever  a-jokin',  talkin'  every  which- 
way,  an'  never  gettin'  anywhiar.  I  never  see 
sech  shaller  nonsense  ez  they  take  fer  wit.  I 


1 68  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

uster  say  t'  him:  'Jim  Flint,  ef  I  was  you,  cf  I 
hed  any  wit  I  'd  show  it ;  '  an'  thet  would  set 
him  off  again  worse  'n  ever.  He  'd  say  I  was 
very  severe  on  him.  I  b'lieve  jes'  what  kep' 
him  a  funnin'  so  was  becos  I  never  once  knowed 
what  under  the  canopy  he  meant  by  any  of  his 
comical  talk,  He  uster  call  me  his  standin'  joke, 
an'  the  best  joke  of  all ;  but  I  knowed  he  liked 
me  a  sight  better  for  not  takin'  it  all  in  than  ef 
I  'd  be'n  one  o'  them  women  thet's  so  everlastin' 
smart 't  they  know  the  whole  story  'fore  a  man  's 
got  two  words  on  it  outer  his  mouth." 

"  Then  yer  an'  Jim  wa'n't  allers  at  swords' 
pints,  ye  see,"  mildly  suggested  her  friend. 
"  Had  n't  yer  better  quiet  down  a  spell  now? 
Jest  see  how  yer  fevier  rages  !  " 

"  Oh,  no  !  "  she  scornfully  rejected  the  well- 
meant  warning.  "  Course  we  had  some  frien'ly 
times.  I  was  always  quiet-wayed,  an'  no  gret 
han'  ter  make  acquaintance  or  go  runnin'  in  ter 
the  neighbors',  so  't  I  kinder  depended  on  Jim 
fer  most  o'  the  comp'ny  I  had.  But  Mother 
Flint  always  come  between  us  ;  ef  she  wa'n't 
there  in  the  flesh,  she  was  there  in  the  sperit ; 
an'  I  had  n't  no  comfort  in  livin'  when  I  see  Jim 
so  sot  about  her." 

"  Now  ye  kinder  try  me,  Leeweeze,  when  ye 
go  on  so.  I  've  got  a  boy  o*  my  own,  an'  I  want 
him  ter  vally  his  mother.  I  sh'd  tho't  yer  might- 
er  respected  Jim's  feelin's." 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  169 

"  But  I  tell  yer,  Charlotte,  it  was  like  this  with 
him,  —  not  his  mother,  but  his  mother.  I  'd  got 
ter  give  in  ter  thet  old  woman,  not  becos  't  was 
my  dooty,  but  becos  'twas  his  will  't  I  should. 
Jim  's  ez  domineerin'  ez  the  next  one ;  an'  his 
pride  teached  him  thet  his  mother  was  part  'n' 
passel  of  him,  an'  I  'd  oughter  take  her  with 
him.  Them  was  his  feelin's,  an'  I  did  n't  respect 
'em,  —  no,  not  a  mite.  I  uster  get  real  bitter 
dwellin'  on  it,  an'  I  'd  say  ter  myself,  ef  it 's  sech 
a  towerin'  thing  ter  be  this  man's  mother,  why 
ain't  it  somethin'  ter  be  his  wife?  Why  don't  I 
count  for  nothin'  'tall  with  him?  And  I'd  fret 
tell  I  was  most  wild  ;  for  nothin'  took  my  mind 
off'n  it.  I  could  fret  jest  ez  well  when  I  was 
doin'  up  my  work,  sweepin'  from  the  north  pole 
ter  the  south  pole  in  thet  shackly  old  house  ez 
any  other  time.  But  the  more  I  thought  on  it 
the  more  I  was  fo'ced  ter  own  thet  Jim  was 
wayed  like  his  mother.  I  could  see  her  ways, 
some  on  'em,  right  over  again  in  him.  I  did  n't 
wanter  own  it;  but  there 't  was.  An'  then  I'd 
think  ter  myself,  '  Come,  Louisa,  why  can  't  you 
get  along  with  one  o'  those  Flints  ez  well  ez  the 

o  o 

other?  '  but  I  could  n't  make  it  the  same  noway ; 
an'  I  kep'  goin'  over  thet  tex'  where  it  says  thet 
no  one  shell  sarve  two  masters,  fer  he  shell  hate 
the  one  an'  love  the  other;  an'  so  'twas  with 
me  about  them  two.  Likely  't  was  becos  I  was 
so  wicked,  wa'n't  it?" 


I/O  SOUTH-COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

"  No,  child,  I  don't  think  't  was  clear  wicked 
ness;  'twas  on'y  natur'.  Yer'm  got  to  enjure 
yer  husband's  faults,  an'  thet's  the  burden  thct 
fits  ter  yer  shoulders ;  but  I  don't  rightly  see 
what  clear  call  ye  hev  ter  bear  an'  forbear  with 
yer  mother-in-law  to  the  eend  o'  time.  Yer  did  n't 
promise  nor  vow  her  nothin',  djd  ye?  No,  she 
ain't  no  mastery  over  ye  by  rights;  an'  I  say 
let  her  go  ter  her  own  folks  ter  find  enjurin' 
patience.'  T  ain't  in  reason  thet  son's  wife  kin 
be  own  daughter  ter  nobody,  let  alone  them 
thet's  sech  ez  she  is.  We  can't  live  our  lives 
but  onct,  an'  she  can't  be  the  fust  tho't  in  no 
house  no  more.  Thet 's  hard  lines,  I  know ; 
but  it 's  what  I  Ve  got  ter  realize  when  my  time 
comes." 

"  Oh,  Charlotte,  yer  're  enough  sight  dif'rent 
from  Mother  Flint;  nobody 'd  ever  wish  yer 
further;  but  I  railly  think  Jim  wanted  her  ter  go 
ter  keep  house  fer  her  brother,  fer  all  he  was  so 
stiff  with  me  about  it  Yes,  he 's  pretty  much 
lost  all  the  good  opinion  he  ever  hed  o'  me. 
He  took  ter  sayin'  things  thet  was  real  cruel ;  he 
could  be  the  most  sarcastic  thet  ever  was.  I 
come  out  in  religion  about  the  time  I  was  goin' 
with  Jim,  an'  I  wanted  he  should  too ;  but  he 
wa'n't  ready  then,  an'  he  don't  belong  now,  an'  I 
don't  know  's  he  ever  will.  He  's  took  up  a  real 
tauntin'  way  now  about  religion,  always  won- 
derin'  why  sech  religious  creturs  ez  women  is 


WATCHING   WITH   THE   SICK.  I /I 

can't  live  together  ez  peaceable  ez  ev'ry-day  sin 
ners  does.  Yes,  he  's  ready  'nough  to  fling  that 
at  me,  sence  he  's  so  disappointed  in  me.  Well, 
it 's  all  over  with  us.  He  knows  my  faults,  an' 
I  know  his'n,  an'  ev'rythin  's  ended  an'  done 
with." 

"  No,  yer  redic'lous  child.  What  air  ye  both 
on  ye  but  a  couple  o'  childun,  settin'  an'  playin' 
scorn  each  ter  t'  other?  Yer  lives  is  jest  a  be- 
ginnin'  in  airnest.  Fer  pity's  sake !  ye  did  n't 
expect  ter  walk  through  life  a-steppin'  on  ter 
roses  like  two  riggers  on  a  valintine,  did  ye? 
Yer  ain't  lived  very  long  inter  this  here  world, 
but  I  sh'd  tho't  yer  'd  knowed  better  'n  thet. 
No :  now 's  the  time,  when  ye  know  each  other's 
faults  ter  show  thet  ye  ain't  all  faults.  The 's 
somethin'  left  yit  ter  count  on.  Jim  ain't  quite 
a  monster,  by  all 't  I  c'n  make  out  ('twould  n't 
be  safe  fer  me  ter  say  so  anyhow),  an'  I  know 
yer  ain't  nothin'  but  a  poor  little  goose.  The  's 
a  futur,  an'  one  wuth  havin',  fer  ye  yit,  or  I  ain't 
no  prophet." 

"  Charlotte,  I  'm  'fraid  you  don't  know  Jim 
ez  well 's  I  do,"  replied  the  girl,  sadly.  "  He 
don't  think  o'  me  ez  he  did  onct.  He  thinks 
his  mother  's  old,  an'  hes  seen  trials,  but  thet  I 
ain't  no  excuse  for  my  bad  tempers,  an'  he 
says,  —  but  there,  I  won't  tell  what  he  says,  — 
I  've  told  too  much,  a' ready." 

"  It's  my  idee  thet  Master  Jim's  a  good  deal 


SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

more  ter  blame  in  all  this  fuss  than  what  yer 
be,  yer  poor  child,"  began  Charlotte,  with  heat ; 
then,  touched  by  the  mute  appeal  of  the  worn 
face,  she  concluded  gently,  "  but  it  don't  help 
yer  none  ter  dwell  on  thet,  dooz  it?  " 

"  Oh,  no,  no,  it  ain't  what  he  said  ter  me,  it's 
what  I  said  an'  done  ter  him  that  comes  back 
now  ter  trouble  me  most,  an'  keeps  me  so  anx 
ious  in  my  mind.  I  b'lieve  when  we  try  to 
please  ourselves  the  most,  givin'  way  t'  our 
feelin's,  and  talkin'  back,  we've  got  ter  pay  fer 
it  all  afterwards." 

"  Yes,  ef  yer  live  long,  yer  '11  feel  thet  more 
an'  more.  Self-pleasin  's  a  snare,  whatever  way 
we  sarch  it  out.  It  ain't  no  comfort  ter  look 
back  upon  self-will,  an'  seekin'  yer  own  pleas 
ure.  I  Ve  hed  my  solemn  times  in  my  life, 
when  I  was  brung  low  with  sickness  an'  trouble, 
—  when  my  baby  was  born,  they  all  tho't  I 
could  n't  never  git  up  ag'in,  —  an'  it  all  come 
ter  me  then,  clear  ez  day.  Self-pleasin'  was 
dust  an'  ashes  in  my  teeth,  but  ef  I  'd  ever  giv' 
a  cup  o'  cold  water  ter  my  inemy,  why,  'twas 
coolness  ter  my  sperit." 

The  words  of  the  faithful  woman,  who  owed 
nothing  to  the  wisdom  of  books,  but  who  had 
patiently  submitted  to  the  discipline  of  life, 
breathed  such  an  influence  as  if  her  searching 
questionings  had  been  voiced  in  the  poet's 
language :  — 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK.  1/3 

"  The  pleasures  thou  hast  planned, 

Where  shall  their  memory  be, 
When  the  white  angel  with  the  freezing  hand 
Shall  sit  and  watch  by  thee  ?  " 

"  Charlotte,"  whispered  Louisa,  after  a  si 
lence,  "  I  keep  goin'  an'  goin'  it  over  in  my 
mind  how  I  come  off  an'  left  him.  I  told  him, 
after  we  'd  hed  one  o'  them  talks,  thet  I  could  n't 
stay  there  no  longer,  an'  I  'd  leave  him  ter  his 
mother,  sence  she  was  the  one  he  thought  the 
most  on,  an'  I  'd  go  home  ter  my  own  folks. 
And  he  said,  never  onct  lookin'  to-wards  me,  'All 
right,  please  yerself;  ther 's  nobody  else  kin 
please  ye,  thet 's  certin.'  An'  so  I  come  off; 
but  I  should  n't  thought  he  'd  took  me  ter 
my  word  so  onfeelin' ;  an'  only  ter  think,  he 
would  n't  even  look  at  me,"  repeated  Louisa, 
dwelling  piteously  upon  this  crowning  misery. 

"  Mebbe  he  dursn't  look  at  ye,  fer  fear  he  'd 
break  down,"  judiciously  suggested  Charlotte. 
"  Yer  take  my  word  fer  it,  't  was  thet.  I  guess 
I  know  a  leetle  more  about  the  ways  o'  men- 
folks,  an'  about  human  natur'  than  what  yer 
do,  child."  Charlotte  caressed  the  slight  hand 
that  she  had  taken  in  her  own  with  motherly 
tenderness. 

"Yer  hed  a  hard  life  on  it,  didn't  ye?" 
questioned  her  young  friend,  momentarily  di 
verted  from  her  own  interests. 

"  I  made  it  hard  fer  myself."     The  words  fell 


1/4  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

slowly  from  her  lips,  and  her  strong,  clear-cut 
profile  was  turned  away  from  the  listener.  "Ev- 
'rybody  in  this  town  knows  the  story  about 
me,"  she  went  on,  in  cold,  measured  tones; 
"how  my  husband  was  a  drinking  man,  at 
times,  though  there  wa'n't  nothin'  else  ter  bring 
ag'in  him,  an'  a  good-natur'd  man  when  he  was 
himself;  but  I  was  proud-sperited,  and  one 
time  —  I  couldn't  be'n  in  my  right  mind,  no 
mor'n  he  was  —  I  vexed  him  so  with  my  tongue 
't  I  driv'  him  away  from  home,  an'  he  shipped  fer 
a  vy'ge,  an'  was  lost  with  the  schooner.  Twenty 
year  ago !  twenty  year  ago ! "  she  slowly  re 
peated,  looking  fixedly  into  the  dim  vacancy  of 
the  room,  as  if  she  gazed  far  into  the  past. 

"Don't,  don't  look  like  thet,  Charlotte;  don't 
take  on !  "  called  Louisa,  "  I  'm  sorry  I  spoke 
so.  I  never  thought;  why,  I  never  see  yer 
look  like  this  "  -  catching  hold  of  her  gown 
with  a  childlike  action,  to  which  her  friend  pres 
ently  responded,  turning  toward  her  again  with 
her  wonted  aspect,  "  Don't  go  back  to  it  all ! 
I  think  yer  're  the  best  woman  I  ever  see,  an' 
always  jest  ez  good  an'  sweet  ez  Cousin  M'hal' ! 
And  ev'rybody  says  yer  Ve  brought  up  yer  boy 
wonderful." 

"  Yes,  I  hed  my  boy,"  breathed  the  mother, 
with  returning  tranquillity. 

"  It  fairly  frightens  me,"  cried  Louisa,  ner 
vously  renewing  her  troubled  confessions,  "ter 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK.  1/5 

find  out  how  homesick  I  be  here  ter  home. 
E v'ry thing 's  so  changed  ter  me,  I  feel  ez  ef  I 
hed  n't  never  lived  here.  I  'm  safter  here  from 
trouble,  mebbe;  but  it's  all  so  strange  sence  I 
come  back  seems  so  I  can't  stay;"  and  she 
moved  restlessly  from  side  to  side. 

"  So  yer  find,  after  all,  thet  ez  miz'able  an' 
wretched  ez  you  'n'  Jim  was  together,  you  'm 
yit  more  miz'able  an'  wretched  apart,"  Char 
lotte  questioned,  with  a  faint  smile. 

"  Oh,  I  dono  's  he  wants  ter  lay  eyes  on  me 
ag'in."  (A  pause.)  "  But,  oh  dear !  I  can't 
no  more  stay  here  than  I  could  git  inter  the 
old  chee-ry  cradle  in  the  garr't  thet  I  was 
rocked  in.  I  hed  some  bitter  times,  an'  some 
hard  cryin'  spells  over  there ;  but  —  well,  I  did 
take  more  int'rest  in  things  than  I  can  now. 
Seems  ez  ef  I  was  done  with  home  fer  good, 
an'  I  dono  where  I  '11  turn  to  now." 

"I  '11  tell  ye,  Leeweeze.  Yer  go  home  ter 
yer  husban',  yer  know  yer  want  ter;  yer  know 
well  'nough  Jim  '11  jump  over  the  house  ter 
hev  ye  back  ag'in,  though  yer  pertend  not; 
an'  jest  you  try,  now,  an'  see  ef  ye  can't  make 
of  him.  I  ain't  the  one  ter  give  ye  no  advice, 
but  my  life 's  giv'  ye  warnin',  an'  yer  go  ter 
yer  own  heart  fer  caounsel.  Can't  yer  try  ter 
rate  yer  husban'  —  an'  other  folks,  too  —  't  won't 
do  no  hurt  —  'cordin'  to  the  best  the'  is  in  'em, 
or  even  'cordin'  ter  what  they  'm  a-tryin'  ter  be, 


1 76  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

more  'n  what  they  actilly  be,  some  on  the  time? 
Thet  's  the  kind  o'  marcy  we  all  on  us  hes  ter 
cry  fer.  Why,  yer  was  speakin'  jest  now  about 
comin'  out  in  religion ;  how  do  yer  think  the 
good  Lord  kin  count  ye  'mong  the  number  o' 
his  handmaids?  More  by  yer  good  desires  in 
yer  prayers  an'  hymns  than  by  yer  righteous 
sarvice,  ain't  it?  Oh!  how  kin  we  shet  up  our 
hearts  from  folks  lest  the  Lord  should  harden 
his  heart  ag'inst  us?" 

"But  Mother  Flint?"  demurred  Louisa,  re 
peating  the  dreaded  name  as  if  it  had  been  that 
of  Mother  Jezebel. 

"  Never  yer  mind  about  yer  Mother  Flint," 
responded  her  adviser,  with  decision.  "  I  'd  do 
the  best  I  could,  an'  not  trouble  about  old  Mis' 
Flint ;  an'  yer  see,  now,  ef  it  don't  all  come  out 
right  at  last." 

Louisa  scanned  the  speaker's  kindly  face,  in 
the  endeavor  to  penetrate  to  the  depths  of  this 
oracular  response.  The  dimple  in  Charlotte's 
cheek, — that  one  indestructible  souvenir  of 
youth  that  continues  to  grace  the  human  coun 
tenance  through  all  the  phases  of  maturity  and 
age  —  faintly  played,  combining  with  the  hu 
morous  light  that  showed  in  her  eyes  to  per 
plex  the  observer  ;  and,  after  a  prolonged 
scrutiny,  her  young  friend  seemed  to  abandon 
further  research  into  the  unfathomed  wisdom 
of  the  other's  experience  ;  but,  sinking  back 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK.  177 

among  her  pillows,  she  announced,  wearily,  as 
if  the  confession  were  torn  from  her,  — 

"  I  suppose  I  shell  hev  ter  go  back,"  and,  spent 
with  the  fatigues  and  emotions  of  the  day,  im 
mediately  burst  into  a  passion  of  sobbing. 

"  Of  course  yer  will,  dear,"  briskly  returned 
her  companion  with  cheerful  sympathy.  "  What 
else  hev  yer  ben  meanin'  ter  do,  this  whole  en- 
jurin'  time?" 

Louisa  neither  denied  nor  affirmed  this  astute 
statement,  but  when  Charlotte  had  finally  soothed 
and  quieted  her,  sent  her  to  see  if  Aunt  Eesther 
were  not  calling. 

"  No,  child,"  announced  Charlotte,  on  her  return 
a  few  minutes  later.  "  You  'm  kinder  weak  and 
nervious,  —  thet's  all;  the' ain't  nobody  stirrin'." 

"  Well,  I  hear  somebody  now  fast  enough," 
insisted  the  invalid.  "  Hark  !  " 

"  Well,  true  ez  yer  live  the'  is  somebody  now 
knockin'  ter  the  front  door.  I  '11  go  right  away." 
And  Charlotte  hastened  to  answer  the  summons, 
which  rapidly  grew  urgent. 

Returning  after  a  long  absence,  she  found 
Louisa  panting,  flushed,  and  wide-eyed.  No 
need  to  tell  her  who  the  late  visitor  was. 

"  Leeweeze,  I  'm  afeerd  ye  don't  know  Jim  Flint 
ez  well  ez  I  do,"  began  Charlotte,  in  stern  mim 
icry  of  her  patient's  recent  words  ;  and  then 
both  women  laughed  and  kissed  and  cried  with 
a  kind  of  soft  violence  quite  unbefitting  the  dis- 
12 


1 78  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

cipline  of  the  sickroom  and  the  habits  of  rustic 
impassibility. 

"  Yer  see,  Leeweeze,.  yer  ain't  hed  the  hard 
times  all  t'  yerself.  Yer  husban's  hed  time  ter 
think  over  these  things,  too,  an"  he  's  tho't  ter  some 
puppus.  I  guess  't  '11  be  a  long  lesson  ter  both 
on  ye.  But  he  never  knowed  a  breath  about  yer 
bein'  sick  these  two  three  days  tell  one  o'  the 
gang  told  him  ter-night  arter  hours ;  an'  then  he 
could  n't  git  no  team  away  up  there  ter  the  Dug- 
way,  so  he  travelled  afoot  ev'ry  step,  an'  when  I 
let  him  in  he  was  white  's  a  sheet,  an'  looked  fit 
ter  drop.  'How's  my  wife?'  said  he.  'Yer 
wife  's  a  sufferin'  woman,'  said  I ;  '  but  her  main 
distress  is  in  her  mind.'  And  then,  Leeweeze, 
thet  gret,  terrible,  sarcastic  man  you  was  a-tellin' 
me  on  jest  broke  down  an'  cried  like  a  baby,  — 
or  a  man ;  for  they  kin  both  on  'em  cry  with  all 
their  might  when  they  onct  git  fa'rly  under  way. 
Matchment  take  ye  both  fer  two  o'  the  foolishest 
young  folks  't  ever  I  see.  I  sha'n't  do  nothin' 
more  fer  ye  !  " 

After  this  style  of  rustic  raillery  tempered 
with  affection,  the  elder  woman  went  on  until 
she  had  completed  that  minute  account  of  the 
interview  which  was  eagerly  exacted  of  her  by 
the  patient. 

"  But  then  he  started  up,  an'  I  tho't  he  would 
ha'  breshed  me  away  from  the  door  like  a  fly ; 
but  I  hild  to,  an'  told  him,  '  No ;  you  can't  see 


WATCHING  WITH  THE   SICK.  179 

her  ter-night.  She  's  dreadful  weak,  an'  nervious, 
an'  I  can't  hev  her  gettin'  all  worked  up ;  an', 
besides,  yer  don't  want  ter  come  in  so,  all  unbe 
knownst  ter  her  folks.  Her  ma  's  comin'  home 
ter-morrer ;  she 's  ben  sent  fer,  an'  you  come 
then.'  I  teched  his  pride  pooty  clus'  with  thet, 
so  't  he  giv'  in ;  but  he  '11  be  here  ter-morrer, 
an'  then  he  wants  ter  be  frien's  with  yer  ma, 
an'  all  yer  folks.  And  don't  yer  fret  no  more 
about  poor  old  Mis'  Flint;  she's  goin'  ter  keep 
house  fer  her  brother.  Did  n't  I  tell  ye 
'twould  all  come  out  right?  I  expect  'twas 
more  'n  hinted  to  her  afore ;  but  anyway  Jim 
stopped  a  few  minutes  ter  home  on  his  way 
here,  an'  settled  it.  But  yer  oughter  rej'ice  with 
tremblin'  over  sech  ez  thet;  an'  I  'm  sorry  •  fer 
Mis'  Flint;  fer  she  's  a  mother,  with  a  mother's 
feelin's,  I  know,  even  ef  she  don't  make  no  very 
agreeable  showin'  on  'em.  Mebbe  yer'll  come 
ter  some  better  onderstandin'  with  her  some 
day,  spacially  ef  she  lives  to  a  good  distance 
off." 

"Oh,  Charlotte,  you  do  make  me  feel  ashamed  ; 
but  I  can't  seem  to  realize  my  wrong*  doin's  the 
way  I  hed  oughter.  Seems  though  anybody 
would  be  solemnized  ter  fare  so  much  better 
than  they  desarved ;  but  I  can't  feel  nothin'  truly 
but  glad,  glad,  glad ! 

"  But  I'  ve  got  ter  own  up  somethin' ;  "  re 
sumed  the  patient  after  a  pause,  and  with  rather 


ISO  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

an  abashed  look.  "What  do  yer  think  !  —  when 
I  sent  yer  out  ter  listen  ef  Aunt  Eesther  wa'n't 
callin'  I  got  thet  pitcher  o'  water  she  brought  up 
ter  keep  fer  her  straw-braidin',  an'  I  drinked  all 
the'  was  left  in  it !  " 

"  The  Lord  preserve  us !  "  ejaculated  the 
watcher  in  consternation.  "Well,  well,  an'  I 
never  see  what  you  was  at !  What  a  han'  yer 
be  ter  git  roun'  folks  !  I  don't  wonder  Jim  #n' 
me  don'  stand  no  chance  with  ye.  I  hope  an' 
pray  ye  won't  hev  ter  suffer  fer  bein*  so  heedless 
an'  keerless.  Here  now,  time  's  come  round  agin 
ter  give  ye  some  more  o'  them  powders." 

But  when  the  draft  was  prepared,  and  Char 
lotte  had  approached  the  bed,  the  deep  breath 
ing  of  its  occupant  told  the  nurse  that  the 
sudden  slumber  of  physical  exhaustion  and 
mental  relief  had  at  last  overpowered  the  irri 
tated  nerves  of  her  restless  charge. 

"  I  declare,  I  won't  wake  her,  not  ter  give  her 
no  doctor's  stuff  thet  ever  was  pestled  in  a  mor 
tar  !  "  rebelliously  uttered  Charlotte  in  subdued 
tones,  but  animated  by  a  sense  of  reckless  de 
fiance  tha't  kept  her  intensely  wakeful  for  the 
next  hour,  during  which  she  anxiously  watched 
over  the  sleeper. 

"  She  seems  ter  rest  jest  ez  peaceful  ez  though 
thet  drink  o'  water  hed  n't  harmed  her  one  mite," 
finally  murmured  the  watcher,  relaxing  her  vigi 
lance,  and  beginning  to  notice  the  chill  of  the 


WATCHING  WITH   THE   SICK.  l8l 

night   air   as   she    shivered    and   drew   up    her 
shawl. 

The  night  wore  on,  and  still  there  was  no 
change  in  the  hushed  repose  that  wrapped  the 
house  in  silence.  Charlotte  at  last  rested  her 
head  for  a  moment,  as  she  intended,  on  the  light- 
stand  beside  the  bed,  and  was  presently  fast 
asleep.  The  wan  hours  of  morning  stole  through 
the  room,  the  solemn  glories  of  dawn  marshalled 
in  the  heavens,  and  the  cheerful  light  of  a  new 
day  dwelt  tenderly  upon  the  soft  innocence  that 
informed  the  childlike  face  of  one  sleeper  and 
threw  a  ray  of  consecration  upon  the  worn  feat 
ures  of  the  other,  that  now  showed  some  traces  of 
youthful  grace,  as  touched  by  the  soothing  spell 
of  slumber.  And  the  place  was  sacred  to  the 
visible  presence  of  that  influence  which  we  name 
the  ever-womanly,  —  that  influence  which,  albeit 
with  many  errors,  and  amid  occasional  reproach, 
still  safely  guards  and  cherishes  the  one  great 
trust  of  humanity,  still  is  true  to  the  duties,  the 
hopes,  and  the  affections  that  centre  in  the 
home. 


JACKSON   DAWLEY'S  WIFE. 

GOOD-BY,  good-by,  Mrs.  Dawlcy.  I  ought 
to  have  been  off  with  the  others,  instead 
of  outstaying  the  season,  like  a  belated  blue 
bottle.  You  must  be  glad  to  see  the  last  of 
us,  for  we  have  been  the  hungriest  hunters  that 
ever  tramped  the  Flats,  and  we  Ve  made  you  no 
end  of  cooking.  You  and  Dawley  can  settle 
down  to  a  quiet  life  now.  You  '11  be  snug  and 
comfortable  enough  here  next  week,  at  Thanks 
giving,  won't  you  ?  " 

The  young  woman  to  whom  this  effusively 
cheerful  leave-taking  was  addressed,  while  her 
hand  was  held  a  second  longer  than  the  speaker 
had  intended  before  meeting  the  dumb  appeal 
of  her  questioning  eyes,  made  no  very  relevant 
or  expansive  answer,  being,  indeed,  little  used 
to  deal  in  other  than  the  most  practical  expres 
sions  of  personal  interest. 

"It's  comin'  on  ter  rain,"  she  announced,  in 
her  usual  languid  and  plaintive  monotone. 
"  Block  Island  looms  up,  and  the  clouds  looks 
oily.  Yer  better  take  the  umbrel',  Mr.  Crown- 
inshield,  or  yer'll  ketch  yer  death.  Hitty,  run 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  183 

an'  fetch  it,  Quick!  yer  father's  waitin'  out. 
there." 

Mr.  Crowninshield  considerately  restrained  the 
movement  of  impatience  with  which  he  would  have 
declined  the  anxiously  proffered  attention,  but 
took  refuge  from  the  unconscious  revelation  of 
nameless  distress  written  on  Susan  Dawley's 
unschooled  features  in  a  final  romp  with  the 
children;  and,  with  an  exchange  of  shouted 
good-byes  between  him  and  them,  and  the  last 
courtesies  of  taking  leave  of  their  mother,  he 
was  driven  away  to  the  station  by  Dawley,  in 
whose  house  a  few  autumn  visitors  had  been 
boarding  while  their  host  accompanied  them  in 
their  daily  hunting-tramps. 

Susan  stood  on  the  rough  door-stone  of  the 
old  Dawley  homestead,  transfixed,  as  it  seemed, 
in  the  stillness  of  patient  pain,  and  looking 
after  the  two  figures  as  they  disappeared  around 
the  turn  in  the  road,  —  one  so  firm,  easy,  and 
self-reliant  in  its  air,  the  other  obscurely  hint 
ing  a  sullen  defiance  in  the  ignoble  lines  of  its 
brute  strength,  and  suggesting  the  saying  in 
which  Le  Roux  has  acutely  expressed  the  bu 
colic  quality,  "  The  peasant  is  a  man  only  as  a 
'block  of  marble  is  a  statue." 

She  was  still  mechanically  looking  into  the 
distance  with  eyes  that  saw  nothing,  when  her 
eldest  girl  pulled  her  gown  to  make  her  hear  her 
reiteration  of  "Manner,  baby's  all  waked  up, 


1 84  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

.and  she  's  fixin'  ter  cry !  "  The  mother  took  the 
fretful,  ailing  child,  and  tried  to  hush  its  weakly, 
wretched  wailings.  But  while  she  monotonously 
soothed  and  crooned,  her  consciousness  was 
filled  with  other  thoughts  than  such  as  were  con 
cerned  with  the  helpless  creature  so  seldom  out 
of  her  arms. 

This  woman  of  twenty-six  had  borne  seven 
children,  and  had  cried  herself  heartsick  and 
despairing  over  the  graves  of  three  of  them,  as 
they  were  made  in  the  bleak  spot  on  the  wind 
swept  hill  where  the  dead  and  gone  Dawleys  of 
a  hundred  years  lay  in  their  unmarked,  un 
guarded  mounds,  and  slept  that  satisfactory 
slumber  which  wraps  the  virtuous  yeomanry 
who  are  buried  in  their  own  acres ;  albeit  their 
repose  was  but  little  respected  by  the  heavy- 
treading  cattle,  or  the  curiously  browsing  sheep. 

Not  that  Susan  dwelt  bitterly  upon  these  mor 
tuary  humiliations.  She  had  known  no  other 
conditions  on  the  adjoining  farm,  her  meagre 
patrimony,  where  she  had  lived  until  her  mar 
riage  at  sixteen ;  and  the  usages  of  these  two 
places  comprised  nearly  all  that  she  knew  of  the 
world.  She  had  never  penetrated  the  limits  of 
her  township,  and  of  its  villages  she  had  never 
seen  the  chief.  Never  had  she  shared  in  the 
bustle  and  the  gayeties  of  the  Carcassonne  of  her 
province,  never  yet  had  realized  her  childish 
hopes  of  joining  in  its  Fourth-of-July  pageants, 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  185 

or  of  beholding  that  palpable  dream  of  all  in 
fantile  delights,  the  toy-shop  window,  crowded 
with  dolls  that  were  seated  in  a  row,  each  bear 
ing  her  price-ticket  in  her  lap,  as  if  the  display 
were  a  crude  tableau  of  a  sale  of  Circassian 
beauties.  When  she  was  first  married  her  hus 
band  used  to  talk  of  taking  her  there  when  he 
marketed  his  farm  products,  and  even  now  he 
would  sometimes  say,  "  I  tell  you,  Suse,  some 
day,  when  it 's  good  goin',  an'  you  ain't  no  butter 
to  make,  an'  the  childun  ain't  sick,  an'  I  have  n't 
no  newspaper  ter  read,  nor  nothin*  ter  hender, 
I  'd  jest  ez  lives  ez  not  take  ye  over  ter  the  Ville 
ter  do  yer  tradin'."  But  such  complacent  offers 
came  less  and  less  frequently,  and  Susan's  timid 
ity,  indifference,  tact,  or  possibly  some  more 
complex  feeling  than  these,  saved  her  from  the 
error  of  taking  this  marital  magnanimity  too 
literally. 

She  had  never  conquered  that  oppressive 
timidity  with  which  she  had  always  regarded 
Jackson  Dawley,  though  they  had  spent  the 
greater  part  of  their  lives  together.  She  used  to 
suffer  with  a  mute  dread  of  the  rough  boy,  just 
as  she  shrank  from  his  great  dogs ;  and  once  she 
saw  him  beating  his  horse  in  a  rage  that  sent 
her  cowering  away,  with  the  feeling  (for  she  was 
then  dimly  aware  of  the  shape  her  future  was 
to  take),  that  it  would  be  a  pitiable  thing  to  be 
wife  to  a  man  capable  of  such  savagery. 


1 86  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

They  had  not  been  schoolmates,  for  Susan's 
delicate  constitution,  the  distance  from  the 
schoolhouse,  and  her  grandmother's  indulgence 
to  an  orphan,  had  nearly  deprived  her  of  the 
educational  opportunities  afforded  by  her  native 
district.  "What  kinder  diff'unce  did  it  make?" 
demanded  her  grandfather,  with  virile  disgust; 
for,  though  he  was  a  yeoman  of  few  acres,  he 
was  none  the  less  imbued  with  the  fine  old  feudal 
spirit  of  the  Rhode  Island  landholder,  and  sorely 
deplored  the  lack  of  heirs  male  "  to  bear  up  the 
Mowry  name."  He  deprecated  the  folly  of  keep 
ing  his  granddaughter  at  school  after  her  four 
teenth  year.  "  She 's  nothin'  but  a  no-account 
little  dish-washer,  anyway,  and  she  c'n  larn  her 
business  best  'round  house,  'cordin'  ter  my 
notion."  In  the  routine  of  farmhouse  work  Su 
san  grew  to  be  an  awkward,  old-fashioned  girl, 
speaking  the  quaint  dialect  of  her  grandparents 
in  archaic  purity,  free  from  the  coarse  alloy  of 
modern  slang.  Dame  Diffidence,  of  Doubting 
Castle,  herself,  was  not  more  shy  than  Susan ; 
and  the  solitary  life  of  the  farm  had  made  her 
odd  and  indescribably  rustic,  but  she  was  un 
touched  by  the  rough  influences  of  the  sordid 
village  life  as  it  is  cheapened  by  the  «rude  publi 
city  of  the  street  and  the  shop.  When  she  went 
out  "  to  walk  abroad,"  as  she  phrased  it,  she 
buried  her  features  in  a  sunbonnet  as  deep  as 
the  Quaker  head-covering,  and  thus  equipped 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  187 

with  modesty's  shield  and  defence,  remotely 
wondered  at  the  hardihood  of  the  girls  whom 
she  saw  growing  bold  in  unyouthful  defiance  as 
they  flaunted  their  imitation  fineries  in  the  garish 
gaze  of  that  school  of  cynicism,  the  sidewalk. 
All  her  associations  were  clean  and  pure  —  free 
from  the  taint  of  a  selfish  and  dangerous  vanity. 
The  year  in  its  round  kept  her  among  healthful 
rustic  sights  and  sounds,  and  brought  her  the 
wholesome  companionship  of  dumb  life,  in  the 
cade  lambs  and  belated  chickens,  for  whom  she 
knit  stockings,  as  her  grandmother  had  it,  and 
whom  she  at  least  established  in  the  warmest 
corner  of  the  kitchen,  whence  mysterious  cluck- 
ings  and  peepings  issued  from  a  dilapidated  bas 
ket.  Through  all  the  season's  changes  of  that 
country  life,  which  has  its  idyllic  aspects  to  an 
observer,  but  is  full  of  the  prose  of  the  severest 
toil,  she  was  zealous  and  diligent,  from  the  first 
pulling  of  spring  greens  in  the  brook-meadow 
to  the  soap-making  in  the  fall,  when  a  bent,  old, 
black  witch  stirred  the  gypsy  caldron  hung  un 
der  the  great  apple-tree,  and  Susan  helped  her 
grandmother  to  accomplish  those  labors  and 
observe  those  traditionary  customs  prescribed 
by  rustic  superstition,  lest,  if  they  were  neg 
lected,  the  much-placated  soap  should  refuse 
"to  come." 

Her  fifteenth  summer  brought  her  that  pre 
mature  inheritance    of  beauty  and  bloom  that 


1 88  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

is  early  won  and  early  lost ;  and  its  exquisite  dazzle 
brought  an  answering  gleam  to  the  dullest  eyes. 
The  gruff  old  Irishman  who  had  for  years  helped 
on  the  farm  in  haying-time,  but  with  whom  Susan 
had  never  felt  well  acquainted,  owing  to  his 
sedulously  cultivated  deafness,  and  his  confusing 
habit  of  invariably  shouting  "Mim  !  "  in  perfunc 
tory  reply  to  all  feminine  interrogations,  —  even 
he  now  doubled  her  embarrassment  by  deliber 
ately  surveying  her,  and  emerging  from  his  inar 
ticulate  state  with  the  emphatic  declaration  that 
she  was  the  makings  of  a  fine  girl ;  further  in 
dulging  in  a  warm  comparison  between  her  and 
one  "  Miss  Honora  McGlathery,  who  was  the 
beautifullest  lady,  and  lived  in  a  grand  house, 
just  forninst  the  Phaynix  Park,"  with  some  further 
particulars  respecting  that  semi-mythical  person 
age,  of  whose  name,  indeed,  old  Phclim's  cronies 
often  had  occasion  to  be  weary.  And  the  cheery 
little  English  woman,  a  red-cloaked,  courtesying 
old-world  figure,  that  sometimes,  in  a  press  of 
work,  brought  an  oddly  foreign  presence  into 
the  Mowry  surroundings,  smilingly  announced, 
"  She  Ve  grown  to  be  the  handsome  gell,  ma'am ; 
she  's  as  slim  as  slim ;  her  eyes  are  as  black  as 
black;  her  skin  is  white  as  milk;  her  hair  is 
that  fair  and  curly;  and  she  has  the  feeturs  of 
a  lady  born,  has  Susan  Mowry;"  and  as  the 
language  of  this  eulogy  very  nearly  resembles 
that  of  the  descriptions  of  young  country  maids 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  189 

in  fairy  tales,  it  may  well  serve  to  render  the 
values  of  an  unspoiled,  primitive  beauty. 

It  was  not  at  all  in  consequence  of  Susan's 
bloom,  which  inspired  these  international  com 
pliments,  but  because  of  her  grandmother's  death 
and  her  grandfather's  decline,  that  her  fate  was 
now  to  be  decided,  and  her  inheritance  to  pass 
into  the  keeping  of  Jackson  Dawley.  Surely 
this  was  an  idyllic  marriage  !  What  more  charm 
ing  pastoral  could  there  be  than  the  tender  union 
of  two  simple  young  lives?  But  Susan  shrank 
with  unfeigned  distaste  from  the  arrangement, 
actually  throwing  her  apron  over  her  head  and 
running  away  when  she  saw  her  destined  swain 
doubtfully  approaching,  by  which  blindly  im 
pulsive  retreat  she  not  only  got  an  ignominious 
fall,  but  incurred  the  weight  of  her  grandfather's 
sarcasms.  Jackson's  only  responses  to  the  pa 
ternal  urgings  were  reluctantly  given,  but  were 
of  a  character  that  slightly  discouraged  the  elder 
Dawley  in  his  first  keen  insistance  upon  the 
scheme.  "  Tell  you  how  'tis,  neighbor,"  frankly 
announced  Old  Man  Dawley  (to  give  him  the 
derisive  title  that  his  hypochondriac  notions  had 
gained  for  him  in  his  middle-age),  "  tell  you  jest 
what,"  he  pursued,  in  the  vigorous  but  enigmatic 
idiom  which  conveys  the  mortification  of  dis 
appointed  match-makers,  "  them  sticks  won't 
fight." 

"  And  I  tell  you  they  shell !  "  explosively  re- 


190  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

torted  Granther  Mowry,  with  a  fine  contempt  for 
the  cobweb  scruples  of  his  crony,  and  bringing 
down  his  ponderous  fist  with  an  emphasis  that 
shook  a  stone  or  two  from  the  tottering  boundary- 
wall  between  the  farms.  "  Say "  (with  an  irri 
tated  disgust  at  the  other's  faint-hcartcdness), 
"what  ails  ye,  anyhow?  D'ye  think  I  don't 
know  my  own  mind  ?  " 

Susan's  mind  in  the  matter,  had  it  been  sought, 
could  not  have  been  very  definitely  stated.  She 
was  but  dimly  conscious  of  the  wrong  done  to 
her  youth  by  the  fate  which  she  was  forced  to 
accept  at  the  sordid  hands  of  her  arbitrary  elders. 
That  Jackson  Dawley  was  a  less  ideal  figure  than 
even  the  conventional  youths  of  those  stories  of 
not  too  refined  a  tone  that  she  was  at  much  pains 
to  spell  out  of  the  village  paper,  might  perhaps 
be  accounted  but  a  flimsy  objection. 

Who  was  there  to  teach  her  that  a  loveless 
marriage  was  an  unholy  one?  From  whom 
could  she  have  learned  that  the  vows  of  mar 
riage  were  in  no  degree  less  solemn  and  sacred 
than  the  ceremonies  of  the  Christian  sacraments? 
Her  own  heart  might  intuitively  prompt  her  to 
these  beliefs ;  but  who  was  to  credit  them  with 
the  stamp  of  experience  and  authority?  Would 
it  be  her  grandmother,  tottering  into  her  second 
childhood  just  as  Susan's  young  feet  began  to 
tread  the  perplexed  path  of  life?  Or  would  it 
be  the  spinster  schoolmistress  who  sometimes 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  191 

boarded  at  the  Mowry  house  on  her  rounds?  — 
a  desiccated  personality;  a  being  of  superlative 
refinement,  who  never  spoke  of  a  baby  but 
under  the  withering  title  of  "  a  babe,"  who 
would  not  refer  to  a  housebreaker  in  less  polite 
language  than  to  inquire  "what  sort  of  a  looking 
gentleman  did  he  appear  to  be?"  and  who,  in 
preparing  fruit  for  the  table,  never  "  snuffed  " 
the  strawberries  as  her  honest  grandmother 
did,  nor  "  hulled  them,"  as  her  mother  had 
it,  but  with  accurate  elegance,  "  removed  the 
calyxes."  From  a  schooling  in  this  learned 
lady's  somewhat  academic  conceptions  of  life 
how  much  of  saving  wisdom  would  our  poor 
Susan  learn? 

Or  was  it  from  the  literature  or  other  influ 
ences  of  the  intermittent  Sunday-school  at  which 
she  was  an  infrequent  attendant  that  she  could 
get  any  guidance  in  these  questions?  The  books 
were  dumb,  and  gave  no  sign;  anything  having 
the  most  remote  bearing  on  the  one  vital  ques 
tion  which  the  young  and  ignorant  readers  would 
be  called  on  to  decide  being  excluded  with  fever 
ish  care  from  their  negative  pages.  And  the 
teachers,  in  all  their  associations  with  the  young 
girls  of  their  classes,  never  strengthened  their 
work  by  that  community  of  interests  which 
might  have  been  formed  between  the  elders  and 
the  juniors  if  motherfy  wisdom  or  sisterly  sym 
pathy  had  not  stopped  just  short  of  the  one 


IQ2  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

point  of  central  importance  in  the  future  of 
these  immature  lives. 

Nor  had  Jackson,  when  bidden  by  his  father, 
in  Susan's  behalf,  to  look  on  her,  and  love,  as  in 
duty  bound,  any  other  excuse  for  his  unwilling 
ness  to  obey  than  his  questionable  interest  in 
"  that  Lewis  girl,"  as  she  was  conspicuously 
known  in  the  mill  where  she  worked,  and  in  the 
sidewalk  parlance  of  the  'ville.  That  Jackson 
had  long  been  the  admirer-in-chief  of  this  not 
inexorable  young  person,  his  father  well  knew, 
and  was  exceedingly  anxious  to  sever  the  con 
nection,  not  only  from  the  fine-spun  motives  of 
moral  prudence,  but  for  the  good  and  sufficient 
reason  that  the  Lewis  girl  had  nothing  but  the 
clothes  she  stood  in,  and  Susan  was  a  "  gal  o' 
prop'ty,"  with  fifty  acres  of  land  coming  to  her, 
and  hundreds  of  dollars  in  the  savings  bank  be 
sides.  The  mundane  old  rustic  put  aside  all 
scruples  concerning  the  undesirable  Miss  Lewis 
with  a  readiness  that  was  nothing  less  than 
Chesterfieldian.  "  Jinny  Lewis  never  wa'n't 
none  too  good,"  was  his  cynical  conclusion ; 
and  "  That 's  her  lookout,"  was  the  dry  rejoinder 
to  the  query  as  to  what  would  become  of  her, 
which  Jackson,  with  no  unmanly  spirit,  addressed 
to  his  honored  parent. 

So  the  marriage  of  reason,  which  occurs  not 
only  in  the  great  world,  but  is  also  evolved  under 
those  sordid  conditions  of  bucolic  life  which 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  193 

foster  the  mercenary  spirit,  was  accomplished ; 
and  it  had  brought  its  penalty  in  the  weight  of 
the  ten  years  that  had  rested  heavily  on  the 
slight  shoulders  of  the  weaker  party  to  the  con 
tract.  These  weary  years  had  visited  Susan 
with  ill  health  that  had  sadly  obscured  her 
beauty.  The  pure  and  delicate  contours  of 
feature  still  asserted  their  lasting  perfection; 
but  all  the  freshness  and  light  had  faded  out  of 
the  face ;  its  bloom  had  gone ;  the  lids  showed 
a  spiritless  droop ;  and  some  deeper  dejection 
than  such  as  is  bred  of  the  dulness  of  a  drudg 
ing  routine  gave  a  rude  pathos  to  the  Yankee 
accent  that  lent  its  prolonged  melancholy  to  her 
tones.  Indeed,  Mr.  Crowninshield's  only  depar 
ture  from  that  grave  and  punctilious  respect 
which  his  hostess,  present  or  absent,  received 
from  him,  was  made  in  that  allusion  to  this 
characteristic  utterance  which  was  conveyed  in 
his  remark  to  a  fellow-sportsman  that  Dawley's 
wife  ought  to  be  called  Mrs.  Drawley. 

Susan  Dawley  could  have  but  little  pride  or 
pleasure  in  her  children.  They  were  all,  like 
the  fretful,  restless  infant  whom  she  now  hushed 
and  rocked,  predestined  to  be  blights,  not  blos 
soms,  on  the  hardy  old  stock  which  had  sud 
denly  withered,  after  a  century's  seasoning, 
under  the  adverse  conditions  to  which  these 
pale  and  spiritless  little  folks  succumbed.  The 
cruel,  penetrating  dampness  of  the  mists  from 
13 


194  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

Cedar  Pond,  which  the  old  house  greedily  drank 
in  at  its  gaping  crannies,  and  the  deathly  chill 
from  the  side-hill  against  which  it  was  built,  so 
that  light  and  air  were  shut  out  from  one  of  its 
four  walls,  drained  away  the  feeble  vitality  with 
which  they  began  that  struggle  for  breath  which 
we  hail  as  life.  It  was  but  a  sorry  Eden  —  that 
home  in  which  Susan,  on  her  first  coming  to  it, 
had  been  met  on  the  threshold  of  her  room  by 
the  portent  of  a  cold,  coiling  black  snake  —  no 
such  infrequent  guest,  as  she  had  learned  by  a 
longer  experience  of  the  persistent  dampness 
and  darkness  of  a  house  partly  entombed  in  the 
hillside. 

Of  course  she  had  heard  something  and  had 
divined  more  of  that  wretched  story  of  Jinny 
Lewis ;  and  though  the  girl,  after  her  dismissal 
from  the  factory,  had  left  the  Ville  to  look  for 
work  in  Providence,  as  she  said,  Susan  still  per- 
turbedly  associated  her  bold,  hardened,  unyouth- 
ful  beauty  with  her  late  dwelling-place,  and 
never  ceased  to  feel  an  unreasoning  jealousy  at 
her  husband's  errands  there,  and  an  instinctive 
shrinking  from  the  sight  of  a  town  that,  to  the 
severity  of  her  conception,  lay  under  the  shadow 
of  a  great  guilt.  She  thought  of  this  village,  to 
her  so  inextricably  connected  with  the  wrongs 
of  a  shameful  history,  with  some  touch  of  that 
ascetic  spirit  which  she  drew  from  the  Quaker 
grcat-grandsire  of  whom  she  had  often  heard  it 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  195 

told  how  when  he  was  aboard  ship,  a-sailing  on 
the  high  seas,  and  the  captain  put  into  London 
town,  he  would  not  so  much  as  look  upon  Baby 
lon,  but  bore  his  testimony  against  her  iniquities 
by  staying  below  reading  the  Word  until  the 
day  came  to  weigh  anchor ;  and,  when  urged  to 
go  ashore,  saying  only,  "  Friend,  thou  art  an 
unstable  counsellor;"  or  ejaculating,  "Lord, 
turn  Thou  away  mine  eyes  from  beholding 
vanity." 

Jackson  neither  comprehended  nor  was  inter 
ested  in  his  wife's  individuality.  Her  moods,  as 
far  as  he  noted  them,  were  such  as  to  provoke 
his  impatience  or  kindle  his  resentment.  Nor 
could  he  ever  quite  forgive  her  former  owner 
ship  of  the  acres  she  had  meekly  brought 
him.  His  most  tolerant  estimate  of  her  was 
that  of  a  mild  contempt;  his  utmost  good-nature 
toward  her  but  faintly  suggested  the  strength 
of  the  ties  that  bound  him  to  his  children ;  for 
he  was  an  indulgent  father.  He  suffered  in  the 
deaths  of  the  children  with  a  fierce  and  angry 
passion  of  loss,  not  unmingled  with  the  spirit  of 
reproach.  If  Susan  had  known  scarlet  fever 
when  she  saw  it,  their  eldest  girl  might  have 
lived,  and  her  death  was  as  a  rankling  wrong  in 
the  breast  of  her  father.  "  I  'd  ruther  ha'  lost 
the  best  cow  in  my  yard,"  he  told  Mr.  Crownin- 
shield,  with  the  unconscious  sincerity  of  a  hard 
man  measuring  his  sorest  regrets  by  the  only 


196  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

standard  of  values  within  the  grasp  of  his  nature. 
But  the  children,  timid  and  shrinking,  like  their 
mother,  and  in  some  occult  way  dimly  aware  of 
the  invisible  barrier  that  separated  the  nearer 
parent  from  the  solicitous  one,  often  met  his  affec 
tion  with  a  peevish  coldness  for  which  he  secretly 
blamed  Susan,  and  perhaps  with  reason ;  for,  .if 
the  average  wife  and  mother  is  sometimes  capa 
ble  of  an  unworthy  jealousy  over  the  affections 
of  her  children,  and  yields  their  father  a  share 
in  them  only  as  a  dole,  can  an  unloved  and  un 
loving  woman  be  expected  to  show  any  finer 
sense  of  the  mutual  magnanimity  of  the  domes 
tic  relations?  Nature  reserves  this  certain  re 
source,  albeit  an  ungenerous  one,  to  the  most 
unhappy  woman,  that  her  children's  hearts  are 
in  her  hand,  and  she  may  turn  them  whitherso 
ever  she  will.  Her  little  child  is  her  inalienable 
possession,  and  whoever  shares  its  love  with  her 
must  often  accept  as  a  grace  that  which  might 
be  claimed  as  a  right. 

Susan,  either  intent  on  her  ailing  child  or 
wrapped  in  her  unwelcome  thoughts,  did  not 
notice  that  the  other  children  had  slipped  away 
into  the  bedroom  ;  did  not  heed  the  shaggy  Irish 
setter  who,  after  a  gloomy  meditation  upon  his 
master's  mortifying  desertion  of  him,  finally  ap 
proached  his  mistress,  of  whom  he  commonly 
made  but  small  account,  to  lay  his  head  in  her 
lap,  for  the  sake  of  society,  and  with  a  view  to 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  197 

breakfast,  vigorously  expressed  in  the  thumpings 
of  an  energetic  tail ;  nor  did  she  see  the  coarse 
black  net  cap  of  her  mother-in-law,  as  its  active 
wearer  whisked  by  the  kitchen  window  a  second 
before  her  appearance  in  the  room. 

"  My  pity  !  Suse  Dawley  !  't  fa'ly  makes  me 
ache  ter  see  yer  a-settin'  there  wastin'  daylight 
hummin'  ter  that  ar  child  like  a  bee  in  a  bottle, 
an'  all  o'  them  young  uns  o'  yourn  highted  inter 
the  best  bedroom,  —  gone  there  ter  riot  and 
carouse,  I  '11  lay  a  penny." 

But  this  scathing  description  was  much  more 
forcible  than  the  reality  of  their  feeble  play  at 
the  illness  which  was  so  often  a  serious  experi 
ence  with  them ;  for  they  had  all  crept  into  bed, 
the  better  to  play  at  being  sick  and  sending  for 
the  doctor.  Dame  Dawley  dashed  in  upon  them, 
and  Susan  passively  listened  to  the  confused 
sounds  of  admonition,  discipline,  and  chastise 
ment,  mingled  with  an  ebullition  of  childish  tears 
and  wrath.  The  grandmother  presently  stood 
in  the  doorway,  reddened  and  rumpled,  but  vic 
torious.  The  spark  of  righteous  anger  kindled 
in  her  eye,  but  further  facial  expression  was  in 
evitably  limited  by  the  curiously  intricate  fret 
work  of  wrinkles  which  masked  the  good  lady's 
features.  If  soul  had  ever  sat  enthroned  in  her 
countenance,  it  had  now  for  many  years  been 
meanly  imprisoned  within  this  enclosure,  and 
could  seldom  be  seen  to  peep  through  the  bars. 


198  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"  Here  they  was,"  she  shouted,  more  in  anger 
than  in  sorrow,  "  sure  'nough,  a  twistin'  an'  a 
turnin',  an'  a  wearin'  out  o'  good  sheets,  wuth 
'nough  sight  more  'n  their  necks  be.  Yer  Ben 
Franklin,  look  here  now !  What  ye  done  tor  old 
Dobbin?  Whiar's  he  gone  ter?  Yer  gran'- 
father  says  ye  must  ha'  lef  the  bars  down  so  't 
he  got  outer  the  lot." 

"  I  never  done  no  sech  a  thing.  I  tell  ye  I 
ain't  seen  hide  nor  hair  on  him !  "  clamorously 
asserted  the  puny  philosopher  of  the  house  of 
Dawley,  with  exhaustive  literalness  of  diction. 

His  assailant  turned  upon  the  next  victim, — 

"  Wai,  Susan,  thiar  yer  be  yit !  An'  tendin' 
baby  's  full  ez  lazy  work  fer  a  woman  ez  fishin' 
is  fer  the  men-folks." 

Susan  indulged  in  the  retort  feminine,  — 

"  Mebbe  it' s  so  long  sence  yer  done  that 
kinder  work  yer  'm  furgot  how  it  draws  onto 
the  shoulders,  an'  makes  yer  side  ache  an'  smart 
every  time  ye  draw  breath." 

"  Not  thet  sorter  heft  would  n't,"  returned 
the  grandam,  nowise  disconcerted,  and  with  a 
meaning  sneer  at  the  puny  proportions  of  her 
infantile  descendant.  "  When  /  hed  babies  I 
//^y/ babies;  they  wa'n't  rag  dawls,  they  wa'n't." 
WTith  this  historical  statement,  Mrs.  Dawley 
emitted  a  short  laugh,  of  the  most  trenchant 
quality. 

Susan,  who  was  no  match  for  her  venerable 


JACKSON   DAWLEY  S  WIFE.  199 

relative  in  these  personal  sallies,  instinctively 
clasped  her  maligned  infant  closer  to  her  breast, 
as  she  drew  her  breath  hard  and  flushed  deep 
with  maternal  rage,  but  sat  speechless  and  star 
ing  while  the  shaft  quivered  in  her  wound. 

"  Wai,"  resumed  the  old  dame,  in  a  more 
pacific  tone,  as  though  magnanimously  satisfied 
with  her  two  righteous  victories  over  her  guilty 
juniors,  "  s'pose  I  must  skite  hum  now  an'  hist 
on  the  dinner-pot.  I  'm  agreeable  for  havin' 
dinner  an'  supper  together  these  here  short  days, 
but  Dawley  he  can't  never  git  enough.  When 
the  Lord  created  man  he  gin  him  a  ter'ble  appe 
tite  fer  vittles,"  she  mused,  with  the  grimness  of 
a  life-long  observer  of  that  phenomenon. 

"  How  is  Father  Dawley?"  asked  Susan,  for 
cing  herself  to  meet  these  friendly  overtures. 

"  The  Lord  knows,  I  don't,"  piously  responded 
his  spouse.  "  His  complaints  comes  an'  goes, 
like  the  old  woman's  soap.  He  's  had  the  hypo' 
now  forty  year  runnin',  an'  I  believe  it 's  healthy. 
Sometimes  I  think  he  's  wus  sence  he  gin  up 
the  farm  ter  Jackson,  an'  then  agin  I  dono. 
Ef  he  scratches  his  finger  he 's  same  's  down 
with  the  lockjaw;  an'  ef  he  gits  a  twinge  o' 
toothache  he 's  goin'  ter  hev  the  tickdullroo, 
sure.  The  schoolmaster  down  to  Number  Six, 
he  's  another  one ;  's  got  ez  many  aches  an' 
pains  ez  there  be  pins  an'  needles  in  a  cushin. 
I  would  n't  give  much  fer  his  schoolin',  but  ter 


200  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

be  sure,  he  keeps  hours  enough.  Wai,  he  comes 
over  nights  ter  see  the  old  man  V  cuddunk  with 
him,  'n'  they  set  'n'  drink  hot  peppermint  V 
sage  tea,  'n'  tell  over  their  poor  spells.  Daw- 
ley's  main  fret  jest  now  is  'bout  his  fun'l.  He  's 
dreadful  feared  I  won't  do  well  by  him.  '  Old 
man,'  says  I,  '  don't  yer  worry.  I  '11  see  yer 
through  when  't  comes  ter  that.  D'  yer  s'pose 
I  sh'd  take  any  satisfaction  't  all  in  it,  ef  things 
was  skinched  up,'  says  I.  '  Deary  me,'  says  he, 
an'  he  fetched  a  groan  with  ev'ry  breath  he 
drawed,  '  I  sha'n't  live  this  night  out.  I  sha'n't 
never  see  ter-morrer  mornin'.'  'Wai,'  says  I,  'ef 
yer  don't,  I  c'n  fly  roun'  an'  git  things  enough 
fer  the  fun'l,  ef  forty  folks  stays  ter  dinner. 
We  'm  jest  killed,'  says  I,  'an'  spare-ribs  an'  pork- 
turkeys  relishes  fust  rate  to  a  fun'l  dinner,'  says 
I.  He  kinder  sperrited  up  at  that,  an'  told  that 
old  story  about  his  Cousin  Congdon,  how  she 
alwas  kep'  a  ham  in  the  house  in  case  Congdon 
should  die,  an'  how  Congdon  et  it  to  her  fun'l 
arter  all.  But  land !  I  must  go  right  off  now, 
it  begins  ter  sprenkle.  I  knowed  't  would  rain, 
fer  Block  Island  light  streamed  acrost  las'  night. 
Say,  Susan,  gimme  some  o'  them  little  aprons 
ter  make,  I  c'n  do  'em  well 's  not ;  "  and  the  ac 
tive  old.  woman  dived  into  a  heap  of  coarse  sew 
ing  that  piled  the  work-basket  "  My  glory,  I 
guess  I  c'n  do  that  one  with  my  old  eyes  cz 
well  ez  you'm  begun  it;  looker  them  great  big 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  201 

stitches  grinnin'  at  yer  all  acrost  it !  Sartinly, 
Susan  "  (with  a  sudden  diversion  to  the  baby), 
"  that  child  is  gonter  look  dreadfully  like  Old 
Man,  sartin  she  is,"  indicating  by  an  expressive 
grimace,  the  grotesque  likeness  between  the 
drawn  and  puckered  features,  just  quivering  in 
a  cry,  and  the  aged  and  tremulous  countenance 
of  the  venerable  invalid.  "  VVal,  what  can't  be 
cured  must  be  endoored.  Metty  take  alivins, 
'ittle  sissy!  Shake  a  day-day  ter  gra'ma,  hey? 
Wai,  good-by,  Susan;  take  good  keer  on  yer- 
self  now  —  ez  ye  seem  likely  ter  !  "  With  this 
parting  shot  the  old  lady  took  her  departure, 
leaving  Susan  somewhat  less  perturbed  in  spirit 
than  her  visitor  could  have  desired. 

Susan's  thoughts  had  not  yet  returned  from 
their  melancholy  wanderings  to  the  worn  chan 
nels  of  domestic  routine,  and  she  still  kept  her 
place,  while  her  morning's  work  awaited  her 
at  the  uncleared  table.  The  American  break 
fast  flourished  in  all  its  pristine  luxuriance 
in  the  house  of  Jackson  Dawley,  and  Susan, 
who  was  a  good  cook,  though  her  neighbors 
declared  her  to  be  a  slack  housekeeper,  had 
never  yet  found  that  the  most  fastidious  of  any 
hunting  party  failed  to  wel'come  her  savory 
dishes,  let  them  appear  when  they  might.  She 
had  never  cared  to  adapt  her  service  to  the 
tastes  of  any  of  her  guests,  until,  with  a  dim  con 
sciousness  that  all  was  not  just  as  Mr.  Crovvnin- 


2O2  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

shield  would  wish,  she  began  to  set  her  dinner- 
table  in  the  centre  of  the  room,  instead  of  leav 
ing  it  against  the  wall,  and  to  disturb  the  ancient 
solitary  reign  of  the  dust  and  cobwebs  that  had 
gathered  in  the  old  house  as  its  mistress  lost 
more  and  more  of  her  girlish  zeal  for  house 
wifery.  But  lately  she  had  attacked  these  dom 
inant  foes  with  a  vigor  that  had  left  more  signs 
of  rugged  toil  on  the  shapely  hand  and  arm 
than  had  marred  them  since,  as  was  said  of  her, 
she  began  to  lose  all  her  ambition. 

It  was  a  strange  fate  that  she,  who  had  never 
before  taken  note  of  her  autumn  guests,  to 
whom  she  might  frankly  have  said,  "  Come  as 
shadows,  so  depart,"  should  have  conceived  this 
forlornly  stifled  regard,  this  piteously  grotesque 
hero-worship  for  one  who  had  always  treated 
her  with  a  scrupulously  distant  respect,  in  which 
there  was  no  hint  of  any  constraint  that  might 
suggest  a  veiled  interest  in  a  woman  whose 
hopeless  secret  could  not  be  guarded  from  him. 
Not  unwilling  to  peruse  the  lovely  lines  of  her 
pure  and  pensive  profile,  whenever  he  happened 
to  note  that  it  was  near, — which  was  not  so  often 
as  might  possibly  have  been  the  case  if  he  had 
not  had  an  absorbing  subject  of  reverie  where 
with  to  fill  the  few  intervals  of  leisure  from  the 
excitement  of  sport,  —  he  was  always  quick  to 
avert  his  glance  when  he  saw  the  shy  distress, 
and,  of  late,  the  deeper  pain  of  consciousness, 


JACKSON   DAWLEY  S   WIFE.  203 

caused  by  his  notice.  It  was  one  of  the  few 
intense  feelings  she  had  ever  known,  though  of 
so  different  an  order  from  that  with  which  she 
had  repelled  the  too  free  admiration  of  a  former 
guest,  protecting  herself  by  the  presence  of  her 
children.  Now  she  secretly  worshipped  a  man 
of  no  very  remarkable  mould,  idealizing  him  for 
the  generous  heights  to  which  his  nature  rose, 
in  her  simple  apprehension,  because,  because — 
oh,  how  poor  a  tale  has  love  to  tell  of  the  why 
and  wherefore  of  its  unquestioning  devotion  ! 
If  this  stranger  spoke  in  a  different  tone,  treated 
her  with  another  manner,  and  looked  at  her 
with  kinder  eyes  than  she  had  ever  known, 
what  spell  could  thus  be  wrought  to  move  any 
but  the  weakest  heart  from  the  fast  moorings  of 
duty?  And  kindness  was  not  wholly  a  new 
thing  to  Susan.  She  had  had  much  kindness 
from  —  her  grandmother  !  If  in  those  girlish 
days  she  had  dreamed  of  a  future  that  life  had 
never  brought  her,  did  she  not  assure  herself, 
in  her  matronhood,  that  she  could  never  think 
of  any  less  unselfish  love  than  the  love  of  her 
poor,  suffering  children,  who  needed  her  so 
much  ?  What  right  had  she  to  indulge  in  grati 
tude  to  a  stranger  for  the  consideration  which 
he  habitually  showed  to  women,  and  which  was 
now  deepened  by  an  influence  of  which,  it  is 
true,  she  knew  nothing?  Because  a  man  who 
flings  his  torn  coat  at  his  wife  as  she  is  walk- 


204  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

ing  the  room  holding  her  restless  child,  with  .1 
muttered  order  to  mend  it  straightway,  which 
sounds  more  like  an  enemy's  curse  than  a  house 
hold  blessing,  contrasts  unfavorably  with  another 
who  asks  a  similar  service  with  gentleness,  ac 
cepts  it  with  friendliness,  and  acknowledges  it 
by  some  kindly  attention  to  the  children,  it  was 
none  the  less  a  sign  of  innate  morbidness  in 
Susan  that  she  dwelt  upon  these  differences 
with  a  bitterness  that  threatened  the  obliga 
tions  of  honor,  truth,  and  loyalty.  Poor  soul ! 
she  was  born  with  that  unhappy  tendency 
which,  though  she  could  not  have  named  it, 
was  none  the  less  real  in  its  cravings,  —  the 
spirit  of  romance.  If  a  woman's  innocent  turn 
for  the  romantic  is  quite  denied  its  natural  means 
of  expression,  —  if  there  is  no  conveniently 
neutral  lay-figure  at  hand  which  she  may  law 
fully  embellish  with  the  drapery  of  her  idealisms, 
as  she  lately  dressed  her  passive  doll,  —  then 
expect  a  grotesque  or  a  tragical  perversion  of 
these  thwarted  instincts.  Said  they  not  well, 
our  pastors  and  masters,  when  they  told  us  in 
our  simple  youth  that  romance  was  a  danger 
ous  thing?  Susan  had  escaped  some  obvious 
dangers  to  the  purity  and  delicacy  of  her  wo 
manhood  in  dwelling  apart  from  the  coarse  vil 
lage  life  ;  but  solitude  also  has  its  peculiar 
snares,  its  tendencies  to  egotism  and  morbid 
introspection  ;  and  perhaps  the  bustle  of  a 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  205 

street,  or  the  gossip  of  elbowing  neighbors, 
though  not  the  finest  of  influences,  might  have 
been  wholesome  for  this  brooding  spirit,  and 
might  have  dulled  its  pain.  Susan  was  not  al 
together  in  fault  that  there  was  so  great  a  lack 
of  harmony  between  her  nature  and  its  environ 
ments  that  her  affections  inevitably  clung  to 
the  best  representative  of  that  worthier  phase 
of  life  to  which,  among  all  her  untoward  sur 
roundings,  she  unconsciously  aspired.  Bred  in 
so  dense  an  atmosphere  of  rusticity  that  social 
ambitions,  in  the  ordinary  sense,  were  utterly 
wanting  to  her  experience,  her  spontaneous  rec 
ognition  of  any  substantial  superiority  of  nur 
ture  was  singularly  quick  and  genuine.  Many 
of  us  are  born  out  of  the  nests  where  we  belong, 
—young  eagles  are  brooded  by  doves,  and  birds 
of  paradise  come  into  plumage  beneath  the 
wings  of  crows  and  vultures.  Only,  if  the  nest 
ling  never  sings  such  notes  as  might  have  been 
its  own  in  its  proper  home,  and  so  never  finds 
its  true  mate,  why,  that  is  but  another  of  the 
many  cruel  tales  of  step-dame  Nature's  ungentle 
rule. 

"  Look  at  the  wasted  seeds  that  autumn  scatters, 
The  myriad  germs  that  Nature  shapes  and  shatters." 

Susan  had  not  glided  into  the  habit  of  letting 
her  thoughts  dwell  upon  one  of  whom  she  had 
no  right  to  think,  and  who,  as  the  sure  instinct 


206  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

of  hopeless  love  instructed  her,  thought  not  of 
her  at  all,  without  some  natural  pangs  of  humilia 
tion,  some  scourgings  of  self-reproach.  Between 
fancy  and  fact,  between  principle  and  folly,  she 
traversed  many  tortuous  paths  of  reverie.  "  He 
never  even  wanted  ter  say  anything  he  should  n't 
ha'  said,"  she  used  to  tell  her  conscience  defiantly, 
so  that  that  grim  monitor  might  be  hushed ; 
while  in  deeper  murmurings  than  those  of  vanity 
she  told  herself,  as  a  smile  of  childish  pleasure 
lighted  her  faded  beauty, ."  Seems  as  if  he  alwas 
liked  ter  see  me  wear  my  blue  gownd.  I  hcerd 
him  tell  Hitty,  '  Yer  mother  looks  like  Mony 
Lizy  ter-day.'  I  dono  who  she  was ;  but  I  don't 
believe  she  was  the  one  that  giv'  him  the  book." 
Poor  Susan  had  not  been  long  in  perceiving  the 
care  with  which,  for  some  inscrutable  reason, 
Mr.  Crowninshield  kept  a  certain  book  among 
the  few  that  he  brought  with  him,  and  that  lay 
about  his  room.  She  studied  it  with  jealous 
passion,  divining,  heaven  knows  by  what  occult 
sense,  that  it  was  from  a  woman,  though  the 
mysterious  initials  M.  D.  L.,  over  which  she 
pored  until  she  gave  them  positive  individuality, 
were  in  the  large,  free,  Minerva  hand  to  which 
at  that  day  feminine  chirographers  seldom  as 
pired.  The  contents  told  her  nothing,  sedulously 
as  she  scanned  them  ;  for  it  was  a  volume  men 
tally  described  by  her  as  one  of  "  poems  and 
poetry,  and  such,"  and  of  course  not  to  be 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  207 

understood  by  anybody.  But  her  resentment 
toward  it  was  as  vivid  as  if  it  had  been  a  sentient 
thing.  In  one  of  her  curiously  childish  passions 
of  wrathful  jealousy  she  flung  the  offending  book 
as  far  as  her  utmost  strength  could  send  it,  then 
caught  it  up  in  a  pallid  fright,  trembling  lest 
it  should  have  been  so  marked  as  to  arouse 
the  displeasure  of  its  owner.  If  the  poor  girl's 
mad  demeanor  was  such  as  would  better  suit 
with  the  favorite  of  a  harem  than  with  the  mis 
tress  of  a  civilized  home,  it  must  be  owned  that 
there  had  been  no  such  efficient  leaven  of  Chris 
tianity  in  Susan's  nurture  as  to  differentiate  her 
very  widely  from  that  unknown  Indian  woman 
who  might  have  had  her  wigwam  dwelling  on  the 
same  sheltered  spot  beside  the  lake  where 
Susan's  hearth-fire  now  burned.  Weak,  and 
childish  still,  though  the  mother  of  children ; 
never  having  been  led  by  a  strong  and  tender 
hand ;  knowing  religion  only  as  a  fluctuating 
emotion,  and  not  as  a  moving  principle  of  life ; 
isolated  from  that  social  influence  and  opinion 
which  to  her  was  but  a  distant  shadow, — she 
had  very  nearly  lost  sight  of  those  traditions  the 
influence  of  which  should  have  checked  the 
tumult  of  her  impulses. 

But  now,  as  her  thoughts  dwelt  painfully  upon 
these  things,  while  her  hands  were  busied  with 
her  household  duties,  her  pale  cheeks  suddenly 
glowed  with  an  honest  blush  as  the  keen  dart 


208  •  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

of  shame  pierced  the  idlesse  of  her  unworthy 
dreamings.  In  the  searching  light  of  her  con 
trite  questionings  what  was  she  ?  what  had  she 
half  descended  to  be  in  thought?  "  Oh,  my 
soul!  "  she  groaned,  "what  be  I  better 'n  Jinny 
Lewis  ?  "  She  shuddered  in  the  strong  revulsion 
of  feeling  that  laid  bare  the  ignoble  reality  of 
her  long  self-deception,  and  her  trembling  hands 
almost  refused  to  do  their  offices.  The  children 
saw  her  agitation,  and  gathered  about  her,  think 
ing  that  she  shared  their  fear  of  the  great  dark 
ness  with  which  the  sou'wester,  now  bursting  in 
gusty  fury  upon  them,  filled  the  house,  as  if  with 
a  sinister  presence.  The  sky  lowered  angrily 
dark,  as  in  a  summer  tempest,  then  faintly  light 
ened,  as  the  rushing  whiteness  of  the  rain  slanted 
solidly  down,  enclosing  the  lonely  homestead  in 
a  watery  sphere,  which  receded  as  the  darkness 
shut  down  again,  and  the  clouds  girded  up  their 
strength  for  another  savage  onset. 

In  the  momentary  lull  of  roaring  waters  and 
tossing  branches,  an  importunate  knocking  at 
the  outer  door  at  length  made  itself  heard,  and 
Susan,  without  a  thought  of  hesitation,  opened 
it  to  admit  the  very  spirit  of  "the  storm,  if  so 
potent  an  essence  had  indeed  condescended  to 
appear  in  the  person  of  a  bent  and  withered 
little  old  man,  opaquely  black  of  visage,  very 
much  rent  and  torn  as  to  his  wind-tossed  gar 
ments,  that  streamed  with  rain  in  every  rag  and 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  209 

tatter,  and  very  abject  in  his  forlorn  and  shiver 
ing  aspect.  His  reception  from  the  house-mis 
tress  was  as  cordial  as  it  would  naturally  be  made 
by  one  who  saw  in  the  half-barbaric  figure  of 
old  Quacca  Noca  no  hideous  portent,  but  merely 
a  familiar  personality,  to  be  greeted  with  the 
urgency  of  rustic  hospitality. 

"  Why,  Quacca !  why  did  n't  ye  come  right  in 
outer  the  wet?  Come  ter  the  fire,  do.  Set  right 
down  in  the  big  cheer,  and  I  '11  fetch  ye  a  dish 
o'  tea." 

"  'Fore  the  Lord,  mistis,"  piously  ejaculated 
the  chattering  old  negro,  with  a  simian  gesturing 
and  show  of  teeth,  "  I  see  lightnin'  jes'  then,  — 
reg'lar  jig-jag  lightnin'!  But  I  'specs  't won't 
harm  folks  none ;  it 's  got  all  the  heat  warped 
out  on  it  this  time  o'  the  year.  Yes,  mistis; 
thenk  you,  mistis,"  —  with  a  low,  deprecatory 
chuckle,  as  the  dish  of  tea,  with  sundry  more 
substantial  dishes,  was  set  before  him ;  "  much 
obleeged  to  you.  Yes,  mistis,  yer  Aunt  Dim- 
mis  she 's  'bout  the  same.  The  nat'ral  bone- 
setter  says  't  her  back  's  got  sprung  over  ter  one 
side,  an'  he  dono  's  he  kin  pry  it  round  agin ; 
he  'specs  now  she  '11  be  a  poor  old  hypocrite  ter 
the  end  of  her  days.  Yes,  mistis,  yes,  I  'specs 
she  will,"  he  nodded,  in  cheerful  conclusion,  with 
the  same  supple  and  insinuating  air  that  graced 
the  utterance  of  his  frequent  "  thenk  you." 
Quacca's  manners  had  been  formed  in  the  school 
14 


210  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

of  slavery;  for  his  grandfather  had  been  shipped 
from  Guinea,  and  his  father,  born  a  slave,  had 
received  as  a  part  of  his  "  freedom  suit "  his 
"  freedom  stockings,"  knitted  at  generous  length 
by  the  industrious  hands  of  his  young  mistress, 
then  of  so  tender  an  age  that  her  work  dragged 
on  the  floor  from  her  lap  as  she  sat  at  her  task. 
Why  Quacca  had  given  the  title  of  his  father's 
"  young  mistis "  to  Jackson  Dawley's  wife  he 
could  hardly  have  told ;  but  it  was  doubtless  in 
unconscious  recognition  of  those  traits  which 
gained  for  her  some  part  of  that  consideration 
which  her  humble  neighbors  commonly  yielded 
only  to  the  quality.  Indeed,  Quacca  loved  to 
seize  any  occasion  for  prostrating  himself,  and 
genuflected  with  all  the  zest  of  the  genuine  Afri 
can  strain.  His  quaint  contortions  and  grimaces 
and  the  sounding  gibberish  of  his  cognomen 
perpetually  suggested  his  savage  progenitors  of 
the  Gold  Coast.  But  he  had  developed  a  vivid 
type  of  Christianity;  and  his  lips  distilled  a 
fluent  piety  as  profusely  as  his  drenched  clothing 
now  shed  water. 

"  Yes,  mistis,  Dimmis  she  needs  ter  get  'ligion. 
I  tells  her,  '  Dimmis,  you  's  a  po'  ole  mustee 
woman,  but  you  kin  seek  for  grace  jus'  the 
same's  the  quality;  and  once  in  grace  allers 
in  grace,  Dimmis.  Thenk  o'  that  now !  '  But 
she 's  a  dreffle  sassy  ole  brack  woman ;  she 
ain't  no  'spect  't  all  for  'fessors.  I  enters 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  211 

inter  my  cluset,  mistis,  jus'  'cordin'  ter  what 
the  Good  Book  says,  an'  shets  the  do',  same 's 
the  tex'  tells  on,  to  wrastle  in  pra'r  befo'  the 
Lord,  and  she  comes  a  bangin'  agin  the  do', 
an'  a-screechin',  '  Come  'long  outer  that  kitchen 
cluset,  you  no-'count  ole  nigger  you  !  I  knows 
ye  !  You  'm  gwine  arter  them  pots  o'  'sarves  ! ' 
Dimmis  she  hankers  arter  the  flesh-pots  allers," 
Quacca  explained  with  figurative  loftiness,  add 
ing  in  more  matter-of-fact  tones,  "  and  them 
was  real  ginger,  what  Miss  Mary  brung  down 
herse'f  from  the  big  house  when  the  ole  woman 
was  sick.  But  laws  !  Dimmis  ain't  never  suited. 
She  's  one  'o  the  discontented  kine.  I  tells  her, 
'  Ole  woman,  quiet  down  !  Ye  can't  have  squash 
an'  squealer  together,  —  no,  no,  ye  can't.'  "  (A 
series  of  softly  obsequious  chuckles).  "  '  Git 
'long,'  says  she ;  '  don'  talk  no  sich  fool  talk  ter 
me  !  '  She  ain't  got  no  'ligion,  —  not  the  fustest 
notion  on  it.  But  'pears  like  I  could  n't  live  ef 
I  had  n't  got  'ligion,  bress  the  Lord !  I  ain't 
got  sich  vittles  ter  home  as  you'm  got  here,  mis 
tis  ;  but  I  'se  got  'ligion,  hosanna ! 

"  *  Oh,  glory,  glory,  shout  hosanna, 
While  my  soul 's  a-eatin'  manna  !  ' 

'Ligion  's  a  gre-at  thing,  mistis ;  yes,  yes,  so 
'tis ;  yes,  yes."  Quacca's  burst  of  song  was  suc 
ceeded  by  the  subdued  chuckles  with  which  he 
emphasized  his  profession  of  faith,  accompany- 


212  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

ing  himself,  as  it  were,  by  sundry  ecstatic  bob- 
bings  of  his  apple-shaped  head,  while  frequent 
gurgles  of  satisfaction  punctuated  his  soft,  thick, 
African  utterance,  his  glistening  canines  express 
ing  an  animal  glee,  and  his  roving  little  eyes 
betraying  a  furtive  glitter,  as  though  he  scented 
prey. 

No  sooner  had  his  modest  hints  met  with  a 
liberal  response  in  the  form  of  a  basket  filled 
with  such  selections  from  the  larder  as  the 
returning  Dawley  might  not  miss  than  he  dis 
covered  that  it  was  no  use  waiting  for  the  storm 
to  be  over,  for  it  was  certainly  the  very  one  that 
lightened  up,  thickened  up,  held  up,  cleared  up, 
and  began  again ;  and  with  a  wealth  of  grinning 
bows  and  thanks  he  took  his  punctilious  leave. 

The  gloom  of  the  autumnal  storm  shut  Susan 
in  with  her  wretched  thoughts;  for  the  knitting 
with  which  she  tried  to  busy  herself  fell  from 
her  helpless  hands.  Quacca's  grotesque  exhor 
tations,  instead  of  moving  her  somewhat  torpid 
sense  of  humor,  had  helped  to  stir  into  pulsing 
life  her  dormant  feelings  of  repentance.  Per 
haps  he  would  not  have  been  the  most  fitting 
missionary  to  a  saner  spirit.  How  heartily  either 
Will  Crowninshield  or  Jackson  Dawley,  each 
after  his  own  manner,  would  have  derided  the 
idea  of  being  moved  to  any  less  mundane  emo 
tion  than  a  gale  of  laughter  or  a  spasm  of 
disgust  by  the  pious  maundcrings  of  an  old 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  213 

chicken-thieving  hypocrite !  But  the  gentle 
soul  of  woman  is  not  so  constituted  that  she  can 
ever  judge  coldly  of  any  appeal  to  her  two  ulti 
mate  sentiments,  love  and  religion  ;  and  with 
her  unquestioning  reverence  for  all  that  stands 
for  these  ideals,  he  must  be  indeed  a  brutal 
suitor  or  a  brazen  Tartuffe  who  cannot  entice 
her  by  the  trumpery  magic  of  his  hollowest  pro 
testations,  or  convince  her  by  the  tinsel  bravery 
of  his  cheapest  lie. 

"  Poor  old  man  !  "  mused  Susan,  with  charitable 
thoughts  of  her  late  guest,  and,  as  is  the  manner 
of  people  who  have  lived  much  alone,  talking 
aloud  to  herself.  "  What  a  shame  folks  do 
scandalize  him  so  !  I  believe  he  's  a  real  good 
old  man.  How  good  he  does  talk !  How  he 
does  love  to  talk  religion !  I  wisht  I  could 
hev  them  good  feelin's  that  he  does !  "  sighed 
the  poor,  childish,  ignorant  woman,  not  blame 
less  before  the  Judge  of  all  hearts,  but  not  of 
ignoble  nature  if  scanned  by  the  standard  of 
human  charity.  "  Oh !  I  don't  believe  I  ever 
got  religion,"  she  cried,  shaking  convulsively  in 
a  passion  of  tearless  sobbing.  "  .1  did  go  down 
them  Jurden  banks,  ez  the  old  elder  said  when 
we  was  all  waitin'  on  the  edge  o'  Cedar  Pond ; 
and  Elder  Stanton  telled  me,  '  Sister,  onct  you 
come  up'ards  o'  them  banks  you  '11  see  Jerusa 
lem,  an'  you  '11  shout  glory,'  but  I  misdoubt 
there  ain't  no  glory  for  me.  I  must  be  one  o' 


214  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

them  backsliders  that  is  giv*  over  ter  their  own 
destruction,"  she  whispered,  shuddering  at  the 
possibility  in  which  her  religious  teaching  had 
instructed  her  of  the  desertion  of  the  creature  by 
an  angry  Creator.  "  Oh,  I  never  meant  to  be 
so  wicked  in  my  mind,  and  hev  sech  feelin's,  — 
ez  ef  I  hated  Jackson  out  an"  out ;  an'  then  to 
feel  —  that  way  —  ez  I  had  n't  no  right  ter  — 
about  —  somebody  else.  Oh!  I  never  half  be 
gun  ter  see  how  wrong  't  was.  Lord  help  me, 
why  be  I  so  set  agin' Jackson?  He's  rough- 
natered,  but  he  ain't  got  sech  a  bad  heart ;  he'  s 
all  wrapped  up  in  the  childun.  Seems  ez  ef 
he  'd  ruther  hev  them  all  ter  himself.  He 
don't  want  me  'round  while  he  hes  them;  an'  I 
can't  feel  't  he  's  anythin"  ter  me  now  no  more  'n 
I  ever  could.  I  don't  hev  no  feelin's  but  wrong 
ones.  Oh,  I  wish  I  was  a  stone!  I-wish  I  was 
a  corpse  !  Oh,  my  soul !  Oh,  my  soul !  Lord, 
save  me !  "  she  implored,  wildly  pacing  the 
room  as  if  to  fly  from  some  unseen  foe,  and,  fall 
ing  into  the  language  long  since  grown  familiar 
to  her  in  prayer-meetings,  she  repeated,  "  Save 
me,  O  Lord,  for  the  Enemy,  the  Enemy  harries 
me !  "  . 

The  rain  dashed  violently  at  the  windows,  and 
the  gusts  shook  the  infirm  old  homestead  vin 
dictively,  as  Susan  mingled  her  weak  cry  of 
human  distress  with  the  Titanic  voices  of  the 
storm;  but  it  was  none  of  these  that  arrested 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  215 

her  wild  words.  Slight  as  was  the  sound  that 
reached  her  ear,  she  started  and  trembled  afresh 
at  the  'pattering  step  of  her  own  child ;  then, 
with  a  sudden  rush  of  despairing  tenderness, 
snatched  the  little  girl  to  her  breast. 

"  Marnier,  take  Sukey ;  Sukey  tired,"  fretted 
the  minute  despot,  whose  pale  little  face  and 
lagging  step  effectively  pleaded  her  cause ;  and 
the  small  voice  went  on  repeating  her  formula 
in  the  same  key  of  childish  mournfulness,  until 
sobs  gave  place  to  comfortable  yawns,  and  these 
yielded  to  great  sighs  of  content,  as  the  throb 
bing  little  head,  hot  with  play,  and  heavy  with 
sleep,  rolled  languidly  upon  the  mother's  arm. 

The  face  that  bent  over  the  sleeper  softened 
to  tears,  and  great  drops  moistened  the  parched 
lids.  A  sigh  that  rose  bearing  the  burden  of  a 
penitent  soul  preceded  the  homely  words  of  re 
solve  in  which  the  awakened  woman  pledged 
herself  to  duty. 

"  Yes,  mother  will  be  good  to  you,  mother's 
poor  little  lamb.  I  won't  be  fretty  with  the 
childun  any  more.  I  won't  give  way,  ef  I  'm 
ever  so  wore  out ;  and  I  '11  try  to  keep  the  house 
fixed  up ;  and  I  won't  mope  round  so  when 
Jackson  is  ugly,  —  half  the  time  he  dono  no 
better ;  and  I  '11  speak  respec'ful  ter  Mother 
Dawley,  —  she  's  a  well-meanin'  woman ;  and  — 
and  —  I  won't  think  them  wrong,  shameful 
things  no  more  !  " 


2l6  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

Susan  did  not  know  that  her  tearful  whisper 
was  the  truest  prayer  she  had  ever  breathed. 
It  did  not  begin  with  "  Oh !  "  nor  end  with 
"  Amen  !  "  as  when  you  made  a  prayer  in  con 
ference  meeting;  which,  indeed,  was  only  ac 
complished  by  the  shy  Susan  because  she  was 
too  shy  to  neglect  the  elder's  repeated  intima 
tions  that  we  would  all  be  glad  now  to  hear  from 
Sister  Dawley. 

With  her  little  daughter's  sleeping  breath 
coming  and  going  so  close  to  her  heart,  Susan 
grew  calm  and  soothed,  and,  in  childish  elas 
ticity  of  mood,  began  to  plan  quite  cheerfully 
for  Jackson's  supper.  She  would  have  hot 
flour-cake,  with  plenty  of  shortening,  and  she 
would  get  out  the  sugar  quince ;  and  there  was 
nice  cold  ham,  or  perhaps  she  had  better  fry 
some  liver.  Jackson  liked  flour-cake,  though 
he  would  grumble  when  he  saw  it,  and  would 
remind  her  that  farmers'  folks  could  n't  live  so 
high  as  them  that  had  a  trade.  But  she  would 
take  care  to  let  him  know,  indirectly,  that  she 
and  the  children  had  dined  contentedly  on  bread 
and  milk.  Not  that  he  would  deny  them  their 
choice  of  anything  there  was  in  the  house ;  but 
he  would  be  better  satisfied  so,  knowing  that  the 
balance  of  household  savings  and  losses  had 
been  properly  adjusted.  And  she  would  try 
not  to  notice  if  he  was  a  little  rough  in  his  way, 
and  she  must  no\  be  so  silly  and  get  nervous 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  217 

when  he  beat  the  dog ;  it  was  all  right,  —  Sport 
needed  training. 

It  all  fell  out  much  as  she  had  expected ;  and 
she  was  sitting  wearily  by  the  evening  fire  with 
her  work,  —  she  and  her  husband  sharing  that 
domestic  solitude  which  Crowninshield  had  so 
effusively  anticipated  for  them. 

Dawley,  who  had  been  working  at  a  dismem 
bered  gun,  finally  pushed  it  away  with  the  air 
of  closing  his  labors  for  the  night,  and  fell  into 
a  study  from  which  he  emerged  with  a  regret 
that  Mr.  Crowninshield  would  n't  be  going  gun 
ning  over  the  Flats  another  fall.  "  I  'd  ruther 
ha'  seen  the  last  o'  some  o'  the  rest  on  'em,"  he 
announced.  "  He  's  a  free-handed  sort,  and  he 
minds  his  own  business,  and  he  ain't  no  fool 
with  a  gun.  I  'd  ruther  go  gunnin'  with  him, 
let  alone  the  money,  than  with  the  hull  lot.  He 
ain't  no  pride  to  him,  nuther,  Crowninshield 
ain't,"  pursued  this  infallible  observer,  warming 
to  eulogy.  "  I  tell  'urn,  he's  jest  like  common, 
he  is." 

He  paused  in  his  praises,  but  no  confirmation 
of  them  came  from  his  unfortunate  wife.  The 
intelligence  he  gave  was  nothing  to  her;  it 
seemed  already  ages  since  that  very  morning, 
but  it  was  terrible  to  hear  her  husband  speak 
in  this  tone  of  unusual  friendliness  of  the  man 
to  whom  she  had  given  so  many  thoughts  for 
which  she  now  suffered  the  pangs  of  repentance. 


2l8  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"We  shaVt  see  him  this  way  again,  I  expect," 
continued  Dawley,  rather  irritated  by  Susan's 
depressing  silence;  "he's  gonter  git  marr'd, 
he  says,  this  winter;  and  then  they  "11  be  travel- 
lin'  quite  a  spell  in  the  Old  Country.  Wai," 
with  the  short  laugh,  so  like  his  mother's,  which 
Susan  so  dreaded  to  hear,  but  was  always  help 
less  to  avert,  "  I  wisht  he  may  light  on  some 
livelier  company  ter  set  up  afore  him  than  what 
a  mummychog  be's."  Mr.  Dawley  puffed  an 
grily  at  his  pipe  as  though  its  contents  had  lost 
their  soothing  virtue. 

Susan  could  not  trust  her  voice,  and  the  few 
words  she  tried  to  utter  died  hoarsely  away. 
Her  whole  energy  was  concentrated  upon  the 
negative  effort  of  restraining  herself  from  a 
spasm  of  hysterical  sobs.  She  need  not  have 
anticipated  with  such  alarm  her  husband's  curi 
ous  observation.  He  had  nearly  dismissed  the 
whole  insignificant  subject  of  his  domestic  life 
from  his  manly  reflections.  For  a  minute  he 
had  been  annoyed  at  his  wife's  queer,  nervous 
ways,  and  had  said  resentfully  to  himself  that 
this  was  a  nice  way  to  behave  to  a  man  that 
always  provided  well,  and  never  interfered  'round 
house.  Well,  as  for  Susan,  she  never  was  what 
you  might  call  lively  company,  and  something 
or  other  had  come  over  her  lately.  Jinny  Lewis, 
now.  She  was  a  live  girL  She  had  her  own 
way  right  along  to  home.  How  she  made  the 


JACKSON  DAWLEY*S  WIFE.  219 

old  folks  stand  'round,  though !  he  mused,  ad 
miringly.  Folks  found  they'd  got  a  cap'n  when 
she  was  'round,  —  dwelling  with  fresh  interest 
upon  the  high  mettle,  florid  color,  and  redund 
ant  figure  of  that  ornament  to  her  sex,  Miss 
Angenette  Lewis.  Dawley  had  none  of  his 
wife's  conscientious  dread  of  forbidden  specula 
tions.  He  thought  of  Jinny  Lewis  as  freely  as 
he  chose;  often  with  a  distinct  regret  that  he 
had  not  married  her,  and  made  an  honest  woman 
of  her;  but  as  time  went  on,  "le  sensations 
associated  with  her  grew  less  potent,  and  the 
ache  of  that  old  longing  was  well-nigh  stilled. 
Such  profitless  querying  with  the  neglected  past 
soon  gave  way  to  plans  for  the  next  day's  work 
of  hauling  a  jag  of  wood,  and  carting  seaweed 
for  the  Bull  Meadow  and  sundry  of  the  other 
acres  which,  as  it  always  irked  him  to  remember, 
had  once  been  Susan's. 

The  silence  of  the  house  remained  so  long  un 
broken  that  the  sounds  of  the  night  stole  in 
upon  the  two  listeners.  The  short  sou'wester, 
which  had  suggested  a  belated  thunder-storm, 
rather  than  an  autumnal  gale,  had  spent  itself  in 
sudden  plashes  of  rain,  and  gusty  pantings  that 
fitfully  tossed  the  creaking  boughs  of  the  .old 
buttonwood-tree,  that  labored  in  the  wind  like 
a  ship  at  sea.  The  last  of  the  fog  was  just  dis 
appearing  before  the  cold  night-breeze,  and  it 
was  curling  fleecily  up  from  the  woods  and 


220  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

waters  that  environed  the  Dawley  homestead, 
rolling  away  in  great  masses  before  the  moon- 
rise,  and  revealing  the  keen  star-sparks  that 
glinted  with  a  wintry  steeliness.  The  haunting 
cry  of  a  loon  came  from  the  central  solitudes 
of  the  lake,  and  Dawley,  with  a  sportsman's  in 
stinctive  action,  rose  to  the  tantalizing  game. 

"  Change  o'  weather,"  he  announced,  as  he 
opened  the  door  and  went  outside  to  listen. 
"  It  "s  cleared  away  arter  dark ;  it  '11  storm  agin 
soon,"  he  added,  quoting  one  of  those  veracious 
weather  signs  that  are  not  likely  to  lose  their 
stormy-petrel  reputation  in  our  zone  of  intem 
perate  climates. 

"  I  hope  not,"  Susan  answered  automatically, 
but  with  a  great  heart-throb  that  almost  over 
came  the  quiet  of  her  manner.  "  All  Thy  waves 
and  storms  have  gone  over  me,"  would  have  been 
the  language  of  her  spirit.  She  went  to  the  door 
and  still  stood  there  looking  dreamily  out,  after 
her  husband  had  come  in.  How  fair  the  beckon 
ing  distance  seemed !  How  tenderly  the  moon- 
wake  rested  on  the  waters  that  gladly  met  the 
lustre  that  sought  them  out  in  the  shelter  of  their 
evergreen  shores.  The  trees  passed  to  each  other 
the  whispered  word  of  their  nightly  salutation. 
It  meant  refreshment,  and  peace,  and  joy,  and 
aspiration.  The  aromatic  freshness  and  softness 
of  the  vapors  still  lingering  beside  the  cedar- 
framed  lake,  penetrated  by  the  keen  breath  of 


JACKSON  DAWLEY'S  WIFE.  221 

the  living  air  that  brought  the  wholesome  in 
fluence  of  wintry  purity,  tempered  the  blood, 
and  soothed  the  sense.  Susan's  untaught  per 
ceptions  drank  in  the  spirit  of  the  scene,  as  surely 
as  clairvoyant  eyes  see  the  things  that  are  hidden 
from  their  ordinary  vision. 

"  Wife,"  called  Jackson  Dawley,  with  a  gruff- 
ness  that  assuredly  lent  no  very  endearing  inton 
ation  to  the  title,  "  did  you  furgit  the  doors  hed 
hinges  onto  'em?  You  'm  cooled  off  this  room 
a  good  one." 

Susan  turned  with  a  guilty  start,  but  her  hus 
band  had  already  left  the  room,  in  which  the  lan 
guishing  tallow  dip  just  served  to  show  the  sordid 
and  grimy  signs  of  a  narrow,  drudging  existence, 
and  seemed,  in  that  quick  glance  of  hers,  to  cast 
a  sinister  light  upon  the  fortunes  of  its  life-long 
tenant  With  a  sudden  impulse,  as  if  the  act 
were  a  return  to  the  freedom  of  her  too  short 
girlhood,  Susan  looked  again  into  the  wonderful 
world  that  lay  beyond  those  closely  crowding 
hills.  Somewhere  there  must  be  happiness  in 
life ;  life  must  hold  some  of  those  things  she  had 
dreamed  of,  but  had  never  known, —  such  things 
as  easily  belonged  to  him  whom  she  did  not 
name  in  her  thoughts,  but  who  had  uncon 
sciously  taught  her  what  the  world  might  be, 
and  what  her  world  was.  Somewhere,  in  the 
distance,  there  was  happiness  for  him  and  his. 
But  here  might  be  peace.  Here,  below  these 


222  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

gentle,  soothing  waters.  How  grateful  the  sleep 
to  be  sought  there  when  the  weight  of  the  day's 
burden  grew  too  heavy  to  be  any  longer  borne  ! 
She  stood  now  between  the  living  and  the  dead, 
—  between  the  children  who  lay  upon  the  hill 
and  those  who  would  soon  follow  them,  from  the 
beds  where  they  lay  sleeping.  Oh,  if  she  could 
but  go  now  to  join  those,  knowing  that  these 
must  follow  after  her! 

It  was  not  an  acknowledged  thought;  it  was 
but  an  undercurrent  of  longing,  stealing  through 
the  obscurer  depths  of  the  consciousness,  while 
Susan  still  stood  irresolute  at  the  door,  as  if  in 
the  attitude  of  leaving  the  threshold  to  fare 'away, 
fast,  and  faster,  out  into  the  freedom  and  solitude 
of  the  great,  wide,  beckoning  spaces  of  the  whisper 
ing  night.  Her  hand  trembled  anxiously  on  the 
latch  as  a  childish  voice  of  crying  came  to  her 
ear,  but  she  kept  her  place,  as  if  by  a  spell.  The 
sound  was  half-hushed,  now,  by  indulgent  tones, 
full  of  the  pity  and  the  anxiousness  of  fatherhood, 
and  touched  by  the  one  influence  that  always 
tamed  that  rude  nature.  The  woman's  face  sud 
denly  softened  from  its  drawn  look  of  pain,  as, 
with  a  quick,  decisive  action,  Jackson  Dawlcy's 
wife  closed  the  door  and  fastened  herself  in. 


PRISCILLA  GALLAGHAN. 

"  I  had  a  little  dahg,  an'  his  name  was  Boof  ; 
I  sint  him  oot  for  a  pinch  o'  snoof  ; 
An'  I  think  me  story  is  long  enoof." 


some  more,  Pat  !  " 
JL      "  Oh,  Pat,  do  say  it  over  real  slow  !  " 

"  Tell  it  onct  more,  oh,  do  !  " 

"What's  a-doin'  here?"  sternly  queried  the 
mother  of  the  clamorously  delighted  audience 
as  she  briskly  entered  Farmer  Hambly's  kitchen. 
"Childun,  guess  you  furgot  yer  comp'ny  man 
ners.  I  sh'd  think  sech  gret  gals  ez  you  be 
mought  ben  ashamed  ter  raised  day  so.  Run 
right  away,  now.  Why,  Pat  Gallaghan,  that  you  ? 
Tis  Pat,  ain't  it?"  pursued  Mrs.  Carr,  putting 
the  superfluous  inquiry  with  a  certain  air  of  rus 
tic  condescension  toward  foreigners. 

"  Yis,  mim,"  replied  the  young  Irishman,  ris 
ing  with  a  crude  attempt  at  deference,  and  seek 
ing  a  moral  support  by  fumbling  with  his  hat. 

"  Why,  dear  suz,  man  !  I  sca'cely  knowed  ye  !" 
affably  remarked  Mrs.  Carr,  whose  visits  at  her 
brother's  house  were  not  of  frequent  recurrence. 
"  Time  I  see  ye  afore  't  wa'n't  long  sence  ye 


224  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

come  over,  an'  ye  don't  look  so  dretful  green  ez 
ye  did  "  (with  a  broad  smile  of  reminiscence). 
"  Don't  wear  them  clo'es  now  't  ycr  brung  over 
from  the  old  country,  do  ye?"  she  demanded, 
frankly  scanning  Patrick's  recent  outfit,  in  which 
the  ruling  tastes  of  his  adopted  country  had  been 
duly  consulted.  The  wearer  received  her  allu 
sion  with  beaming  pride,  while  the  lady,  without 
pausing  for  reply,  went  on,  "  Yer  waitin'  t'  see 
Danil?  He  's  gawn  up  t'  the  Snuff  Mill." 

"  Yis,  mim,  I  har-rd,  since  I  was  in  it,  he  was 
afther  goin'  up  there;  but  I  tought  he  wud  be 
in  prisintly,  an'  it  was  Misther  Slocum  bid  me 
give  a  missage  till  him." 

"  You  ben  up  t'  the  Corners,  an'  going  back 
now  ter  Dutch  Island,  I  s'pose?  You  'm  far- 
min'  for  Slocum  right  along  now,  ain't  ye,  sence 
he  come  off  the  Island,  an'  went  ter  live  with  her 
folks.  Well,  that 's  a  pretty  good  lay  fer  yer, 
Pat.  I  sh'd  think  yer  'd  feel  real  set  up." 

"An'  ye've  a  right  to  say  that  same,  mim," 
soberly  agreed  Patrick,  with  modest  assurance. 

"An'  how's  your  wife,  Patrick?"  continued 
Mrs.  Carr,  quite  uninformed  of  any  recently  im 
pending  domestic  crisis,  but  merely  on  conde 
scension  bent,  "say,  how's  Priscilly  ?  " 

"  Thankin'  ye,  mim,"  returned  Patrick  the 
straightforward,  with  a  deference  that  was  height 
ened  by  a  certain  air  of  proud  solemnity,  "  me 
wife  was  delivered  of  a  young  son  at  twinty  min- 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  225 

utes  afther  wan  o'  the  clock  last  Choosday  mar- 
nin'  —  glory  be  to  God  !  "  and  he  crossed  himself 
fervently,  all  unaware,  in  his  peasant  simplicity, 
that  he  had  outraged  the  American  proprieties, 
and  offended  the  matronly  delicacy  of  his  in 
dignant  hearer.  That  lady  did  not  stay  to  offer 
congratulations,  or  to  make  further  inquiries, 
but  left  the  room  with  an  abruptness  that  can 
only  be  described  as  flouncing  out  of  it;  and 
hurriedly  returning  to  her  place  in  the  feminine 
conclave  of  the  sitting-room,  gave  loud  expres 
sion  to  her  disgust  at  the  plain-speaking  of  "  them 
dretful  coarse  Irish." 

Her  comment  failed,  however,  to  make  an 
impression  commensurate  to  that  imparted  by 
her  news.  "  Teh,  tch,  tch"  sounded  from  her 
sister-in-law's  sympathetically  clicking  tongue, 
burdened  with  a  rush  of  feelings  that  pressed 
too  strongly  and  suddenly  to  find  their  way 
through  the  channels  of  articulate  speech;  and 
each  woman  of  the  neighborly  circle  added 
some  exclamatory  fragment  of  utterance  to 
the  medley  response  that  greeted  Mrs.  Carr's 
announcement. 

There  was  danger  that  Patrick's  error  would 
be  overlooked,  if  not  condoned,  in  the  zest  with 
which  they  fell  to  on  receiving  this  fresh  morsel 
of  intelligence.  The  flutter  and  cackling,  the 
shrill  confusion,  and  the  pleasing  dismay  rife 
among  the  party,  suggested  the  reception  by  a 
15 


226  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

staid  flock  of  hens  of  an  ear  of  corn  flung  sud 
denly  among  them.  No  less  interest  could  be 
aroused  by  such  an  opportune  event  in  a  rustic 
community,  where  the  only  really  engrossing 
romance-reading  is  that  of  the  book  of  human 
life,  which,  when  daily  conned,  is  a  continued 
story  that  has  many  a  dull  and  tedious  page, 
many  lapses  and  omissions,  and  many  grievous 
repetitions. 

"Well,  well,  of  all  I  ever  did"  breathlessly 
exclaimed  Aunt  Hambly;  "risin"  a  week  old,  I 
do  declare !  and  I  never  heerd  a  lisp  on  it,"  she 
added,  in  the  aggrieved  tone  of  one  \vho  had 
been  defrauded  of  a  culminating  sensation. 
"Well,  times  is  changed.  I  tell  'urn  things 
goes  so  queer  now,  in  these  new-fashioned 
times,  't  I  don't  know  no  more  about  my  neigh 
bors  than— -than  the  child  unborn,"  she  con 
cluded,  rhetorically  suiting  her  style  to  her 
subject. 

"  What  Priscilly  was  a-thinkin'  on,"  bitterly 
proclaimed  Mrs.  Carr,  "  to  go  an'  be  married 
by  a  priest  to  a  Paddy,  and  she  Elder  Hall's 
own  gran'da'ater,  tries  my  possibles  ter  find 
out." 

"  Well,  you  see,"  uttered  Mrs.  .Hambly,  in 
deprecating  excuse,  taking  up  with  increased 
interest  the  familiar  narrative,  freshly  illustrated 
by  the  last  piece  of  news,  and  going  again,  with 
renewed  satisfaction,  over  the  beaten  ground 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  22/ 

of  neighborhood  .gossip,  "  she  was  all  alone, 
kinder.  She  hed  n't  no  own  folks,  ah'  her  step 
mother  said  ev'rythin'  she  could  lay  her  tongue 
to  about  her,  so  't  Priscilly  got  all  discouraged, 
an'  notioned  that  folks  was  ag'inst  her.  The' 
wa'n't  no  real  fault  ter  find  with  her,  but  she 
vva'n't  gifted  t'  airn  her  salt.  She  took  arter 
her  mother's  folks ;  they  was  all  so  —  did  n't 
know  their  heads  from  their  elbers,  any  on  'em ; 
but  they  was  all  clever  folks,  an'  Priscilly  was 
real  pleasant  spoken.  All  the  neighbors  said 
't  was  a  livin'  disgrace  when  she  marr'd  ez  she 
did ;  but  I  hed  cha'ity  fer  her.  Pat 's  good- 
lookin',  fer  Irish,  an'  stiddy,  or  stiddier  'n  most 
on  'em,  an'  gits  toler'ble  wages;  I  expect  it 
makes  a  good  home  fer  that  gal.  She  could  n't 
turn  her  hand  to  an  earthful  thing  that  would 
make  her  any  livin'.  Time  an'  time  agin  s's  I 
ter  my  husband,  s's  I,  '  Father,  what 's  goin'  ter 
become  o'  Priscilly?  She  ain't  no  more  sense 
'n  that  kitten;  '  and  he  'd  shuffle  out  on  it,  man- 
fashin,  an'  when  I  hild  him  to,  '  Well,'  s's  he, 
'  she  mus'  git  marr'd.'  An'  lo  an'  behold  she 
did,  —  sech  ez  'twas.  An'  I've  heerd  say  she 
makes  out  pretty  well,  consid'rin'.  The'  was  ole 
Mis'  Bowsuns  went  over  an'  stayed  with  her, 
—  Priscilly  alwas  humored  them  old  Charles- 
town  squaws,  —  an'  she  told  me  she  never  see 
sech  a  house  fer  wings  an'  holders,  an'  the 
hearth  svvep'  up  neat 's  a  pin." 


228  SOUTH-COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

"  She  '11  want  somethin'  'sides  turkey  wings  t' 
live  on,"  tartly  commented  Mrs.  Carr,  who  was 
still  smarting  under  a  sense  of  personal  indig 
nity.  "  Must  be  gret  sight  o'  vittles,  Cynthy, 
in  a  Paddy  house,  t'  be  sure !  Soup  o'  geese- 
heads,  an'  pin-feather  thickenin',  I  rayther  think  ! 
Them  's  the  kind  of  outlandish  dishes  the  Gal- 
laghans  '11  learn  her.  The  mice  stands  round 
with  tears  in  their  eyes  in  her  cluset,  I  guess !  ' 

«N0>  I  —  I  guess  not,  Maria  Jane,"  meekly 
ventured  her  sister-in-law,  slowly  running  a  knit 
ting-needle  through  her  hair,  "  I  dono  but  what 
Priscilly  's  comf 'table,  's  fur  ez  that  goes." 

"  I  hope  ter  my  soul  she  '11  hev  a  good  gettin' 
up,"  sighed  the  last  speaker's  daughter,  a  pale 
and  delicate  young  woman,  with  restless  eyes, 
and  a  nervous,  anxious  expression,  who,  as  she 
spoke,  had  just  laid  her  sleeping  baby  in  the 
settee  on  rockers  which  served  as  a  combination 
of  cradle  and  chair  for  mother  and  child. 

"  Who  's  takin'  keer  on  the  woman?"  weight 
ily  demanded  Nurse  Crombins,  whose  profes 
sional  engagement  in  the  house  was  just  clos 
ing,  but  whose  imposing  presence  intensified 
the  interest  of  the  conversation,  and  finely  sus 
tained  the  dignity  of  the  occasion. 

"  Well,  his  mother 's  over  there,  I  sh'd  guess," 
hazarded  Mrs.  Hambly,  with  a  manner  that  im 
plied  no  attempt  to  extend  the  charity  devoted 
to  Priscilla  so  far  as  to  include  the  Irish  mother- 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  22Q 

in-law.  Nurse  Crombins  sewed  on,  in  a  grimly 
neutral  silence,  but  of  Mrs.  Carr  it  might  be 
said  that  she  gave  tongue  with  the  energy  of  a 
whole  pack  in  full  cry. 

"  His  mother  !  Old  Nora  Gallaghan  !  Horns 
an'  hufs !  I  'd  ez  lieves  hev  our  old  Speckle  ter 
nuss  me !  " 

"  I  was  on'y  wonderin',"  hinted  the  nurse, 
at  whose  measured  accents  the  conclave  was 
hushed  in  respectful  attention,  "  I  was  jest  cal- 
culatin'  what  kerrickter  o'  rags  they'm  put  on 
that  child  !  " 

An  echoing  murmur  of  mildly  sarcastic  intent 
ran  around  the  deferential  group. 

"  Poor  cretur !  "  solemnly  pursued  the  nurse, 
whose  words  came  slowly,  hindered  by  a  port 
liness  that  lent  itself  to  gravity  and  dignity  of 
demeanor  rather  than  to  the  proverbial  jollity  of 
the  stout,  "  to  think  of  her  lyin'  there,  tied  hand 
an'  foot,  an'  with  nobody  thet  's  hed  experience 
ter  dress  that  child  so  's  ter  make  human  shape 
on  it,  an'  ter  work  over  its  head  ter  shape  it  ez  a 
head  lies  got  ter  be  shaped,  ter  look  decent." 
This  was  the  special  fad  of  Nurse  Crombins. 
"  'Course  it's  a  nice  job,  I  don't  deny  it 's  a  nice 
job,"  continued  the  artist  in  plastic  humanity, 
kindling  with  her  theme,  "an"  them  thet 's  goin' 
ter  spile  it  should  n't  lay  a  finger  t'  it;  but  this  I 
will  say,  thet  there  never  was  one  o'  my  babies 
but  what  I  fixed  up  a  real  nice  round  head,  — 


23O  SOUTH-COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

round  ez  a  harnsum  apple,  artcr  I'd  worked  on 
it  a  spell.  You  take  their  heads,"  she  said,  ad 
dressing  the  company  in  a  raised  voice,  and  with 
an  animated  manner  that  was  fearfully  suggestive 
of  a  Feejee  cook  detailing  her  choicest  recipe, 
"  you  take  an'  feel  o'  their  heads,  an'  they  '11  give 
middlin'  easy,  like  putty,  ye  know,  and  you  c'n 
fix  'em  up  any  shape  that  suits  best;  but  I  like 
'em  good  an'  round.  The'  was  folks  that  I 
nussed  with  onct  down  ter  the  Dugway.  I  won't 
name  no  names,"  -—  magnanimously  declared  the 
narrator,  who,  indeed,  knew  there  wras  no  need 
of  further  particularity  with  so  well-informed  an 
audience, —  "but  she  was  the  notionalist  woman 
't  ever  I  nussed  —  dretful  awd  —  an'  she  told  her 
mother  she  would  n't  hev  me  workin'  so  on  that 
child's  head.  Well,  s's  I,  'course,  ef  the  woman 
is  notional,  notions  must  rule,  s's  I,  but  of  all 
possessed  !  "  pursued  the  priestess  of  the  cult  of 
the  physique,  breaking  into  a  high-pitched  laugh, 
eloquent  of  injury,  "ter  go  t'  the  Dugway  ter  hear 
on  new  idees  an'  fashins  ain't  what  I  sh'd  proph 
esied.  'Cordin'  ter  my  mind,  you  mought  's 
well  live  out  o'  the  world,  an'  done  with  it,  ez 
live  up  there  in  them  woods,"  she  concluded, 
with  another  wrathful  laugh,  echoing  of  a  rank 
ling  resentment 

"  Well,  you  might 's  well  be  in  Gret  Swamp 
ez  on  Dutch  Island,"  remarked  Mrs.  Carr,  with 
the  exasperating  calmness  of  an  absentee  in 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  231 

whom  long  residence  in  an  adjoining  township 
had  cooled  the  fervor  of  native  jealousies  and 
partisanships. 

"  Pat  don't  like  bein'  so  fur  from  a  priest,  he 
says,  poor  misbrung-up  cretur,"  commented 
worthy  Mrs.  Hambly,  with  a  sigh  of  benevolent 
melancholy.  "  How  solemnizin'  't  is  ter  see  them 
thet  hes  immortle  souls  grovellin'  like  the  beasts 
thet  perish !  "  she  continued  in  a  thoughtful 
strain. 

"  Yes,"  agreed  Mrs.  Carr,  "  Priscilly  Hall  was 
courtin'  jedgment  an'  no  less,  when  she  unekilly 
yoked  herself  to  an  onbeliever." 

"  Let's  hope  't won't  light  on  her  now,"  spoke 
Mrs.  Hambly,  with  matronly  sympathy. 

"  We  don't  know  what  a  day  may  bring  forth, 
Mis'  Hambly,"  admonished  the  nurse,  with  that 
air  of  lugubrious  prophecy  which  was  as  much 
a  part  of  her  due  professional  bearing  as  gravity 
is  the  badge  of  an  undertaker.  "  Ther'  is  years 
when  the  women  most  all  goes  that  way.  Five 
year  ago  —  I  reck'lect  it  ez  ef 'twas  yist'd'y  —  ez 
it  mought  be  fall  o'  the  year,  like  this,  I  was  nus- 
sin'  ter  old  Reedy  Ely  Joe's,  an'  the  woman  was 
smart  's  I  ever  see  one,  to  all  appayrence,  when 
the  fevier  come  on  like  thet,  an'  — " 

"  'T  would  n't  be  no  merrycle,"  broke  in  the 
severe  and  godly  Mrs.  Carr,  leaving  the  nurse 
aghast  at  the  audacity  of  her  interruption,  "  ef 
jedgment  should  overtake  them  thet  will  live 


232  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

with  publicans  and  Romers.  To  think  a  gal  o* 
her  bringin'  up  should  furgit  where  she  sprung 
from!  I  believe  it's  our  dooty  ter  come  out 
from  among  them,  and  be  ye  separate,  ez  Elder 
Hines  said  in  his  exhortin'  last  Sabbath,  now  when 
popyism  an'  skepyism  is  a-walkin'  about  hand  in 
hand,  seekin'  whom  they  may  devour." 

"Well,  there  's  Danil,  come  seekin'  what  he  kin 
devour  fer  supper,  I  expect,"  interpolated  Mrs. 
Hambly,  with  surprising  levity,  "  an'  I  ben  so 
betwottled  a-sottin'  here  talkin',  't  I  ain't  sot 
table,"  and  she  bustled  away. 

The  evening  was  well-nigh  over,  according  to 
the  neighborhood  customs,  when,  as  the  house 
hold  had  again  met  in  the  keeping-room,  Mrs. 
Carr's  "  watch-eye,"  as  her  sharp  vision  was 
known  in  the  family,  espied  a  light  and  a  figure 
pausing  with  it,  outside  the  door-yard. 

"  Do  see,  Danil,"  exclaimed  Mrs.  Hambly, 
whose  glance  had  followed  her  sister's,  "  who 
that  is  comin'  here  at  half  arter  eight  o'clock!" 

The  excellent  couple  went  out  upon  their  old- 
fashioned  porch  to  meet  their  visitor,  who  with 
equal  promptness  accosted  them,  while  she  *\vas 
yet  struggling  with  the  picket  gate  which  con 
spired  with  the  rude  gusts  of  the  October  night 
to  hinder  her  progress. 

11  Come  over  afoot  an'  alone !  "  she  shouted, 
with  energetic  pants,  as  she  hurried  toward  them  ; 
"  but  I  ain't  come  in  the  dark,  anyway,"  she 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  233 

triumphed,  as  she  displayed  the  barn  lantern, 
and  like  Mr.  Pope's  shepherds  rejoicing  in  the 
full  moon,  "  blessed  the  useful  light." 

"  Kine  of  a  revolvin'  light,  ain't  it,  neighbor  !" 
humorously  inquired  Farmer  Hambly.  "Sh'd 
think  't  was  the  lantern  to  Pine  Judy  Pint  yer 
hed  ref'rence  to." 

"Now,  father!  "  admonished  Mrs.  Hambly,  in 
reproachful  distress;  and,  "Hey?"  vaguely 
gasped  the  guest,  that  honest  matron  being 
quite  unaware  of  her  picturesque  appearance  as 
the  wind  momentarily  eclipsed  her  luminary  in 
the  flappings  of  her  substantial  petticoats. 

"  There,  now,  don't  you  mind  him  one  bit,  Mis' 
Baton,"  coaxed  her  hostess,  tendering  a  super 
fluous  encouragement ;  for,  "  I  don't !  "  laconically 
responded  the  dame,  further  remarking  "  and  I 
never  knowed  them  that  did  !  "  —  dismissing  the 
unprofitable  subject  to  inquire,  with  a  breathless 
eagerness  that  evidently  feared  to  have  been  an 
ticipated  in  its  proposed  recital,  "  Heerd  an'thin' 
from  Priscilly  Hall,  that  was,  ter-day?" 

"Why,  yes,"  began  Mrs.  Hambly,  intending 
to  luxuriate  in  narrative ;  but  Mrs.  Baton  hushed 
her  with  an  imperative  signal. 

"  Pat  Gallaghan  little  knowed  what  news  was  a 
travellin'  to-wards  him,"  she  announced.  "He'd 
ben  three  days  up  't  the  Corners.  Slocum  sent 
fer  him  to  come  up,  and  Slocum's  folks  kep' 
him  there  doin'  odd  jobs  till  this  art-noon.  I 


234  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

see  ole  Mis'  Bovvsuns  when  she  jest  come  off  the 
Island,  'long  in  the  forenoon,  an'  s's  she,  '  By 
Jo-by  !  '  —  you  know  how  them  old  Charlesto\vn 
squaws  will  swear  —  '  /  call  her  a  very  sick  wo 
man  ;  '  an'  towards  night,  when  I  see  the  hearse 
goin'  by,  an'  I  run  out  t'  ask  D'rius  who  was 
dead,  fer  I  thought  mebbe  he  was  gettin'  things 
ready,  'The'  ain't  nobody  dead  jest  now,'  s's  he; 
'  I  'tn  on'y  gittin'  of  it  home  from  the  carr'age 
shop ;  but  from  all  I  hear,  I  shall  have  to  bury 
Pat  Gallaghan's  wife  pretty  soon,'  s's  he,  and  he 
driv  along.  Thinks  I,  I  '11  let  Mis'  Hambly's 
folks  know  te  onct,  fer  I  thought  we'd  oughter 
go  right  over  there,  an'  it  might  be  so  as  Mis' 
Crombins  could  make  out  ter  go."  She  ap 
pealed  deferentially  to  that  potentate.  "  Say, 
Mr.  Hambly,"  she  adjured,  with  recovered  as 
surance,  "don't  ye  think  we  better  go?  Can't 
ye  boat  us  over  there?  " 

Farmer  Hambly  at  once  fell  into  the  mental 
attitude  with  which  he  met  any  proposition. 
By  his  meditative  air  he  would  seem  to  have 
dived  deep  into  the  crystal  well  of  Truth,  the 
better  to  consult  her  as  to  his  measured  reply. 
•  Finally  rising  to  the  surface,  he  conveyed  the 
judgment  of  the  goddess  in  the  leisurely  an 
nouncement,  — 

"  Wai,  I  would  n't  wonder  much  but  what  I 
could." 

Satisfied  with  the  unobtrusive  gallantry  of  this 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  235 

response,  the  zealous  Mrs.  Baton  turned  to  Nurse 
Crombins. 

"  Kin  you  make  out  without  me  ter-night, 
Lucindy,"  solemnly  inquired  that  authority,  re 
ferring  the  matter  to  the  young  mother. 

"  Oh,  Aunty  Crombins,  I  should  think!"  re 
monstrated  Lucindy,  with  a  nervously  reproach 
ful  sob.  "What  do  ye  take  me  fer?  "  She  ran 
out  of  the  room  and  presently  returned  with  a 
hastily  made-up  bundle,  which  she  put  in  the 
nurse's  lap. 

"  Give  my  love  to  Priscilly,  an'  tell  her  I  sent 
thet  little  dress  to  the  baby." 

"  Why,  you  'm  robbed  yerself,  Lucindy,  hain't 
ye?"  protested  her  almoner. 

"  Oh,  no,  I  want  the  baby  ter  have  it  an'  wear 
it.  It 's  a  real  pretty  one.  Tell  her  I  made 
every  stitch  of  mine  myself,"  she  began  with  a 
glow  of  girlish  animation  that  chilled  again 
under  the  returning  consciousness  of  calamity. 

"  Mother,"  calmly  observed  Mr.  Hambly,  who 
had  apparently  again  taken  counsel  of  the  in 
visible  nymph,  and  was  prepared  to  repeat  the 
oracle,  "  seems  ter  me  you  'm  a  gettin'  that  bun- 
nit  on  kinder  hine  side  afore,  ain't  ye?"  He 
surveyed  his  spouse  with  an  abstracted  air,  as1  of 
one  who  diligently  essays  a  judicial  decision. 

"  Oh,  land  o'  saints,  so  I  be  ! "  she  cried,  ridding 
herself  with  a  jerk  of  the  cumbrous  head-gear. 
"  I  'm  addled  so  I  dono'  what  I  'm  about." 


236  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"  Bet'  stay  right  where  ye  be,  mother,"  ad 
vised  her  husband.  "  Yer  git  sick  jest  ez  easy 
ez  Tallin'  downstairs,  an'  they  'm  got  all  the 
hospital  they  want  over  there." 

"  Mis'  Hambly !  I  am  fa'rly  amazed  at  ye  !  "  an 
nounced  one  who  spoke  with  more  than  marital 
authority.  "  Who  's  ter  see  ter  my  baby,  ef  you 
go  off  ter  stay  all  night,  fuzzino  ?  " 

"Well,  well,  I'll  give  't  up,"  yielded  the 
kindly  soul,  "  but  I  did  feel  a  drawin'  to-wards 
that  poor,  dyin'  child,"  and  she  broke  down  in 
undisguised  tears. 

"  Cryin',  be  you,  mother,  becos  I  'm  goin'  off 
with  these  here  women  folks?"  queried  Mr. 
Hambly,  with  a  lightness  benevolently  intended 
to  relieve  the  oppressive  quality  of  the  scene. 
"  Why,  don't  take  't  so  hard  's  all  that.  I  sh'll  be 
'round  agin,  ef  so  be  't  they  don't  run  away  with 
me."  But  this  graceful  homage  fell  unheeded 
at  the  matronly  feet  of  the  oblivious  Mrs.  Baton, 
and  the  preoccupied  Nurse  Crombins. 

The  ladies  followed  him  to  the  shore,  and  the 
boat  received  the  substantial  forms  of  its  master, 
his  neighbor,  and  the  nurse,  stoutly  riding  the 
water  even  after  that  fat  aunt  of  Brentford  had 
clambered  in. 

"  She  ain't  no  tub,"  muttered  Mr.  Hambly,  as 
he  took  up  the  oars  and  affectionately  addressed 
himself  to  the  only  feminine  object  within  ken 
of  a  figure  to  appropriate  the  encomium. 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  237 

"  They  say,"  observed  Mrs.  Baton,  after  a 
brief  space  of  silence,  during  which  the  en 
shrouding  and  engulfing  glooms  above  and 
below  seemed  to  have  stretched  out  some  invis 
ible  hand  that  steadily  dragged  them  to  a  name 
less  goal,  "  that  Priscilly  hed  railly  sprighted  up, 
an'  took  holt  ter  work  ez  ef  she  'd  got  some  em- 
bition,  't  last.  And  they  tell  how  she  was  jest 
ez  pleased  an'  proud  's  ef  she  'd  marr'd  one  o' 
the  town  council  theirselves;  and  ez  fer  Pat,  he 
sets  his  eyes  by  the  baby." 

"  Mfh  !  "  retorted  the  nurse,  with  the  scorn  of 
a  superior  mind,  "Priscilly  ain't  deeper 'n  the 
well,  an'  them  shiftless  Irish  thinks  all  the  world 
of  a  young  son,  ez  they  says,  no  matter  'f  they 
ain't  got  the  fust  rag  ter  put  on  its  back." 

The  words  of  the  wise  woman  could  not  be 
gainsaid,  and  Mrs.  Baton  at  once  abandoned  her 
feeble  line  of  defence. 

The  influences  of  the  night  and  the  mystery 
of  the  waters  were  again  unbroken  for  a  little 
space  by  the  doubtful  harmony  of  human  speech 
when  — 

"  S'pose  you  knowed  Pat's  had  that  child 
sprinkled?"  resumed  Mrs.  Baton,  with  signs  of 
controversial  disgust. 

"  Don't  say !  And  Priscilly  was  knowin'  to 
it?" 

"  What !  Ain't  yer  heerd  SHE  was  sprinkled 
quite  a  while  back?  " 


238  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"That  so?"  struck  in  Mr.  Hambly,  resting  on 
his  oars  in  a  mild  shock  of  surprise,  and  indulging 
in  the  worldly  recreation  of  a  prolonged  whistle. 
"Wonder  what  old  Elder  Hall'd  sayter  that?" 

"I  sh'd  think  he'd  rise!"  wrathfully  ejacu 
lated  the  bearer  of  the  intelligence. 

"  A  pretty  thing  tcr  whistle  at,  Mr.  Hambly  !  " 
rebuked  the  nurse.  "An"  you  holdin'  office 
under  the  church  this  minute !  " 

"  Where  was  her  religion  ? "  demanded  the 
other  exponent  of  virtue. 

"  Wai,"  thoughtfully  observed  their  escort, 
making  the  long  slow  sweeps  that  were  favorable 
to  meditation,  "  I  see  somethin'  in  print  onct 
that  kinder  jingles  with  the  subjeck,  ez  you  may 
say."  Mr.  Hambly  further  prefaced  his  valued 
quotation  by  a  diligent  clearing  of  his  throat. 
"Twas  in  a  sort  o'  play-actin'  book  was  the 
saw,  an'  it  run  like  this,  '  What  but  love  is  a 
woman's  religion?'  I've  tho't  on  them  words 
consid'ble  many  times  sence,"  pursued  the 
speaker,  who  had  delivered  the  phrase  with  a 
curious  care,  "  ez  I  've  lived  along,  an'  I  won't 
say  but  what  the'  's  somethin'  in  "em." 

"  More  shame  fer  you,  then,  Danil  Hambly," 
retorted  Mrs.  Baton.  "  The  church  oughter 
deal  with  ye,  an'  make  a  public  example  on  ye 
fer  winkin'  at  sech  onrighteousness.  Ef  folks 
could  n't  rise  above  Priscilly  Hall's  notions  yer 
might  talk !  " 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  239 

"  Sho,  sister  Baton,"  said  her  plain-speaking 
neighbor,  with  a  peculiar  twitch  of  the  mirthful 
muscles,  and  recklessly  charging  on  a  highly 
dangerous  ckeval  de  bataille,  "  yer  ain't  so  hard 
hearted  by  half  ez  yer  purtend.  Yer  ain't  no 
Baptis'  born  yerself,  ye  know.  I  c'n  remember 
the  time  when  yer  was  raised  a  Methodis"  afore 
ever  yer  see  the  Deacon,"  broadly  hinted  this 
indiscreet  theorist  concerning  the  occult  religious 
influences. 

"  That 's  neither  here  nor  there,"  tartly  began 
the  lady,  with  a  snap  of  the  eyes  which  the  faint 
glimmer  of  her  lantern  failed  to  transmit  with  all 
the  force  that  might  have  been  desired. 

"  Wai,  here  we  be  ter  the  Island,  anyway,"  an 
nounced  her  antagonist,  with  a  craven  haste  that 
betrayed  an  anxiety  to  capitulate  on  any  terms. 
"  I  '11  be  over  ter  the  lighthouse  an'  nef  ye  want 
me." 

The  women  climbed  the  crumbling  slopes, 
struggling  against  the  gusts  that  blew  the  dust- 
clouds  of  the  Island  in  their  faces,  and  crossed 
the  turfy  meadow  that  bordered  on  the  peat 
bog. 

"Pat  said  how  her  name  'in  religion'  was 
Julye,"  observed  Mrs.  Baton,  continuing  the  in 
terrupted  discussion. 

"  Oh,  yes,"  assented  her  listener;  "  I  knowed 
she  was  named  Jul-ye  Priscilly  arter  both  on  her 
gran'mothers  and  a  silver  tea-spoon  apiece. 


240  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

I  Ve  heerd  say  the'  's  ben  the  time  when  the'  was 
a  silver  teapot  in  the  Hall  family." 

"  Gallaghan's  folks  calls  her  Julye,  an'  nothin' 
else,"  said  Mrs.  Baton,  snapping  the  thread  of 
reminiscence  which  her  friend  was  just  unwind 
ing.  "The  Priscilly  part  on  it  never  come  handy 
to  'em ;  but  they  said  Julye  was  a  real  Catholic 
name." 

"  Ain't  it  takin'  up  yer  cross,  Mis'  Baton," 
sighed  the  other,  "  ter  think  how  they  '11  bury 
that  poor  gal  arter  their  fashion,  with  no  fun'l  ser 
mon,  nor  nothin'  ter  show  respec'  ter  the  dead?" 

"  Yes,  it's  awful,"  lamented  her  companion. 
"  Priscilly  was  simple,  but  she  was  ez  good  a  gal 
ez  ever  walked  the  airth ;  an'  now  ter  think  that 
she  can't  hev  Christian  burial !  " 

Their  sympathetic  exchange  of  opinions  was 
interrupted  as  they  neared  the  little  low-roofed 
farmhouse  by  the  clamor  of  sentinel  geese  ;  and 
their  knock  was  promptly  answered  by  Honora 
Gallaghan,  which  sounding  appellation  was  borne 
by  a  diminutive  old  woman,  weazen  and  wiry  as 
only  old  Irish  women  can  be. 

"Whereabouts  be  the  woman,  Nora?  "  asked 
the  nurse,  assuming  her  professional  manner, 
and  naming  the  sufferer  by  the  official  title 
which  was  always  used  in  designating  one  of  her 
patients. 

Nora  expressed  a  thankful  sense  of  the  kind 
ness  of  their  visit,  and  led  them  through  the 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  24! 

kitchen  to  the  keeping-room,  which  according 
to  rustic  custom  had  been  appropriated  as  the 
sick-room. 

"  Burnin'  tug,  be  you,  Nora?"  queried  the  ob 
servant  Mrs.  Baton,  as  she  noticed  the  smoulder 
ing  peat-sods  in  the  kitchen  fire-place.  "  Well, 
I  never ! " 

The  art  displayed  upon  the  pictured  walls  of 
the  keeping-room  spoke  a  various  language,  and 
presented  a  curious  mingling  of  the  distinctive 
marks  of  race  and  creed.  An  engraved  likeness 
of  General  Washington  faced  a  violently  colored 
lithograph  of  Pius  IX.  A  looking-glass  sur 
mounted  with  the  American  eagle  emphasized 
the  national  idea,  and  the  usual  funereal  scene 
of  tomb,  weeping-willow,  and  mourner  might  be 
supposed  to  stand  for  that  indefinite  thing  some- 
•times  vaguely  known  as  "the  Protestant  religion." 
At  least  the  northern  side  of  the  room  committed 
itself  to  nothing  more  distinctive  than  this.  But 
the  southern  wall  was  much  more  pronounced  in 
its  indications ;  for  it  bore  a  shelf  on  which  stood 
a  plaster  image  of  the  Madonna,  and  near  it 
hung  a  rosary.  More  neutral  decorations  were 
supplied  by  the  cuts  from  the  New  York  illus 
trated  papers  and  the  gorgeous  fashion-plates 
that  had  been  tacked  up  here  and  there ;  while 
the  odd  contrasts  and  analogies  obtaining  among 
the  miscellaneously  inherited  belongings  of 
Patrick  and  Priscilla  might  be  still  further  noted 
16 


242  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

in  the  taste  of  the  feverishly  tinted  lithographs, 
of  which  one  represented  Byron  writing  out  a 
poem  (in  a  neat,  clerkly  hand),  and  invoking 
the  Muse,  who  looked  over  his  shoulder  in  the 
person  of  some  darkly  jealous  Marianna  or 
Margharita ;  or  the  Yankee  clock,  in  the  lower 
half  of  which  art  had  painfully  transfixed  a  man, 
whose  conspicuous  and  conventionally  treated 
heart  lucidly  revealed  the  pendulum  at  every 
swing;  or  the  devoutly  mystical  study  of  the 
Sacred  Heart  of  Mary,  very  faithfully  and  ana 
tomically  rendered,  with  a  lavish  use  of  pigments. 
The  room  was  made  comfortable  by  sheep-skins 
laid  down  for  rugs,  some  of  them  colored  with 
domestic  bark-and-herb  dyes.  Braided  rag  mats 
lay  on  the  floor,  and  testified  to  the  industry 
of  the  maker.  There  were  also  clean,  rustling, 
corn-husk  mats,  such  as  were  originally  the* 
handiwork  of  the  Charlestown  squaws  ;  and  one 
of  them  was  lying  just  as  it  had  fallen  half- 
finished  from  the  busily  weaving  fingers  of  the 
young  housewife. 

Nurse  Crombins  stood  looking  down  at  the 
patient,  whose  widely  open  eyes  were  vacant  of 
recognition.  "  She  ain't  got  her  senses,"  mut 
tered  the  nurse.  Yet  the  two  women  uttered 
their  comments  with  bated  breath. 

"  Oh,  nuss,  ain't  she  changed  beyond  any- 
thin'?  I  sh'd  never  dreamp'  'twas  her." 

"  She  'm  changed  ez  fast  ez  ever  I  see  'em 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  243 

changed.  You'd  say  she  couldn't  be  less 'n 
fifty  year  old." 

"  She  looks  older  'n  my  mother  did  the  day 
she  died.  Hark  ter  that,  now  !  —  of  all  the  suf- 
ferin'  sounds !  " 

The  sick  woman's  features  trembled  piteously, 
and  an  inarticulate  moaning,  in  which  was  no 
note  of  returning  consciousness,  finally  shaped 
itself  into  the  low  cry  of  "  Oh,  my  soul !  oh, 
me  !  oh,  my  soul !  " 

"  Do  you  b'lieve  the  's  somethin'  or  'nother  't 
grieves  her  poor  dyin'  soul?"  begged  Mrs.  Ba 
ton,  in  an  awe-struck  whisper,  and  gazing  dimly 
through  the  sudden  tears  that  had  surprised  her 
well-seasoned  self-control. 

The  nurse  shook  her  head,  with  the  decision 
of  long  experience. 

"  Mostly  things  gits  fixed  in  folkses  heads 
when  they  git  so  fur  gone  ez  this,"  she  ex 
plained  ;  "  an'  they  '11  say  'em  over  an'  over, 
till  friends  goes  distracted  ter  hear  'em.  An' 
Priscilly,  she  was  a  gret  han'  ter  say  'My  soul !' 
Don't  yer  know  how  she  'd  look  up  jest  ez 
quick,  'f  ye  told  her  an'thin'  p'tic'lar,  lookin'  so 
laughy,  an'  her  eyes  a-shinin',  an'  so  pleasant- 
spoken,  an'  '  Oh,  my  soul ! '  alwas  on  to  the  tip 
o'  her  tongue  !  " 

As  the  image  recalled  by  the  nurse's  words 
rose  to  their  minds,  the  two  looked  again  by 
a  common  impulse  toward  the  bed,  and  the 


244  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

helpless,  death-stricken  fgure  lying  there;  then 
turned  away,  and  asked  after  the  child. 

"  It 's  the  foine  choild  he  is."  affirmed  Nora, 
with  pride,  "  and  cries  as  sthrong  as  hear-rt 
could  desire ;  but  at  all  evmts  he  slapes  ristliss 
the  night,  an'  his  brathin'  is  quare." 

"  Queer  !  I  sh'd  think  't  was  !  "  pronounced 
the  nurse,  on  examination.  "  Ain't  you  no 
sense  't  all,  woman  !  This  child  's  comin'  down 
with  lung  fever.  An'  no  wonder !  Here  's 
where  you  'm  kep'  him  right  along,  I  s'pose, 
right  inter  the  draft  o'  this  here  old  door." 

"Ah,  now!  An'  I  niver  moinded  it!  I 
niver  tought  it  cud  hur-rt  him  !  "  and  Nora  laid 
the  finger  of  perplexity  against  her  withered 
cheek. 

"  Well,  you  see,  Nora,"  Mrs.  Crombins  in 
structed  her,  "  this  ain't  one  o'  your  sort  o'  ba 
bies,  altogether.  He  ain't  gonto  be  tough  ez  a 
pitch  knot,  fer  he  's  part  Yankee,  and  Priscilly 
never  was  rugged." 

"  Oh,  whativer  will  I  do  at  ahl?"  helplessly 
lamented  the  guilty  grandmother. 

"  Ef  thet  air  child  was  one  o'  my  babies,"  pro 
claimed  the  nurse,  suddenly  stiffening  out  of 
neighborly  kindness  into  a  dignified,  profes 
sional  neutrality,  and  regarding  the  Gallaghan 
infant  with  an  abstracted  air,  as  being  one  of 
those  unfortunate  innocents  consigned  by  fate 
to  the  uncovenanted  mercies  beyond  her  dis- 


PRISCILLA  GALLAGHAN.  245 

pensation,  "  Ef  't  was  mine,  I  say,  I  'd  break  up 
that  strictur'  with  mullen.  I  'd  wet  some  mullen 
leaves  in  milk  an'  water,  an'  bind  'em  on  the 
chist,  an'  put  drafts  't  his  feet.  That 's  what  / 
sh'd  do." 

"  But,"  vaguely  implored  Nora,  "  where  is  it 
I  'd  be  afther  foindin'  this  mullen  the  night, 
mim?  " 

"'Course  ef  you  hain't  got  it  gethered,  you 
can't  git  it  now,  Nora,"  admonished  the  Yankee 
neighbor,  with  a  strong  touch  of  contempt. 
"  But,"  generously  resigning  the  claims  of  pro 
fessional  dignity,  "  well,  see,  you  got  some  rye 
meal?  " 

"  Rye  male,  is  it?  An'  Julia  allays  did  be 
kaapin'  that  same  in  it." 

"•Well,  you  jest  fetch  me  some  meal,  an'  some 
mustard  an'  vinegar,  an'  I  '11  see  what  I  c'n  fix 
up  ter  help  the  baby.  We  'm  come  ter  stay  with 
with  yer  ter  night,  ye  know.  There  '11  be  things 
ter  do  here,  an'  yer '11  want  somebody  —  ter 
watch,  yer  know  —  yes,"  she  said,  with  a  glance 
of  experience  toward  the  bedside,  to  which  she 
presently  returned. 

"How  long's  she  ben  like  this,  Nora?"  she 
asked  of  the  old  woman,  whose  quaint  features 
were  touched  with  the  signs  of  that  nobler  lan 
guage  which  grief  writes  even  on  the  least  spirit 
ual  type  of  countenance. 

"  Shure,  she  had  a  right  to  be  will,  intoirely, 


246  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

ixcipt  she  caught  cowld,  jist.  An'  it 's  mesilf 
cud  n't  till  how  it  happened  her,  for  the  plaace 
do  be  jist  beautiful  for  hate,  barrin'  the  cracks 
in  the  flure.  But  it  was  the  day  before  yisther- 
day  she  comminced  to  bur-rn  wid  the  faver  fit 
to  brek  your  hear-rt." 

"  What  could  ye  think  on  ter  do  fer  her, 
Nora?"  queried  the  nurse  with  pitying  curiosity. 

"  Shure,  I  sprinkled  her  wid  the  wather  from 
the  blissid  will  that  the  Riv'rind  Mither  bid  me 
take,  when  I  saarved  the  Sisthers  of  Sint  Clare," 
was  the  innocent  reply. 

"  H'm !  "  ejaculated  the  other,  refraining,  with 
remarkable  self-control,  from  further  comment. 
"  An'thin'  else  come  inter  yer  head  ter  do, 
Nora?  "  she  demanded  with  chilling  sarcasm. 

"  I  gev'  her  the  tay  be  times,  when  she  cud 
sup  it,  an'  I  sint  post  haste  for  the  docthor," 
answered  the  unsuspicious  narrator.  "  The 
ould  Docthor  Shute  it  was  kem  till  her  before, 
from  Wickford,  but  whin  the  kaaper's  bye  wint 
afther  him,  they  towld  him,  at  the  South  Firry, 
the  docthor  had  gahn  in  the  vissel  for  Newport ; 
but  owld  Timmy  Rooney,  that  lives  jist  forninst, 
rin  afther  the  mail  wagon,  an'  sint  wur-rd  to  the 
Wakefield  docthor,  —  I  niver  can  moind  his 
name  jist,  bit  at  ahl  evints  he  be  that  one  they 
does  be  afther  cahlin'  Docthor  John  Hinry,  —  an' 
the  coach  jist  cript  an'  cript  along,  siz  thim  that 
was  in  it,  an'  the  docthor  docs  be  gahn  aff,  whin 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  247 

they  reached  the  plaace.  An,  whin  it's  tin, 
elivin  miles  ye  do  be  livin'  away  from  the  doc- 
thor,  ye  '11  brek  yer  hear-rt  wid  the  lookin'  an* 
the  waitin'.  An'  I  did  be  ixpictin'  Patrick  widout 
fail ;  I  niver  dhramed  they  had  rason  to  kape 
him,  an'  he  niver  stipped  fut  widin  the  dure 
while  she  was  sinsible,  an'  the  docthor  kem 
afther  he  did.  An'  whin  he  kem  till  her  bed 
side,  he  jist  luked  har-rd  at  her,  an'  filt  her 
pouls,  an'  tahked  wid  me  aboot  her,  an'  at  last 
he  siz,  an'  tur-rned  away,  '  It 's  no  use,  she 's 
goin'  through.'  'Ye  lie,  docthor,'  siz  Patrick 
(but  it 's  me  belafe  he  niver  sinsed  what  wur-rds 
he  was  spaakin'),  '  me  wife  will  be  well  again, 
plaze  God.'  'No,  me  lad,'  siz  the  docthor, 
spaakin'  till  him  qui-ite  like,  '  she 's  goin' 
through  the  eternal  gates.'  Thin,  '  Nora,'  siz 
he,  taakin'  me  to  the  wan  side,  '  Nora,  for  God's 
sake  get  me  aff  o'  this  island.  Have  yees  niver 
a  sail-boat  here  ? '  siz  he,  for  't  was  in  a  row-boat 
he  was  fitched  over ;  '  for  I  want  to  stip  me  fut 
ahn  shure  an'  get  baack  to  me  sick  paaple,'  siz 
he ;  '  an'  that 's  all  I  '11  ahsk  of  yees,'  siz  he," 
concluded  Nora,  who,  with  curious  effect,  per 
sisted  in  gilding  the  doctor's  Saxon  speech  with 
the  sunny  riches  of  her  own  redundant  brogue. 
"  So  the  kaaper's  bye  wint  off  wid  him  to  shure, 
an'  I  wint  baack  to  Patrick." 

"Where  is  Patrick,  now?"  asked  Mrs.  Baton, 
in  wonder  at  his  absence. 


248  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"  Ah,  mim,"  sighed  the  old  woman,  "  't  is  yer- 
silf  knows  the  min  does  not  be  like  us;  they 
niver  sit  an"  sup  sorra;  but  they  wud  be  afther 
sthrivin'  wid  dith  itself.  T  was  long  e'er  he  gev 
over  ahl  hopes ;  an'  thin  he  ran  wild  to  hear  her 
cryin'  out  ahn  her  sowl.  '  Mither,'  siz  he,  '  I 
must  go  off.  to  shure  an'  fitch  the  praste  till 
her;  '  for  the  praste  was  ixpicted  at  the  Firry 
the  night  to  marry  Timmy  Rooney's  gur-rl  to 
wan  o'  thim  little  Frinch  byes  that  wur-rks  in 
the  facthory  to  a  plaace  they  cahls  Shady  Lea. 
'  Ah/  siz  I, '  niver  sthir  to  go ;  shure  the  kaapcr's 
bye  will  go  there  beyant  for  yees.'  '  No,'  siz 
he,  sthernly,  '  me  wife  is  no  hiritic  anny  moore,' 
siz  he ;  '  an'  there 's  no  hiritic  of  thim  ahl  shall 
stip  a  stip  to  do  her  a  saarvice,'  siz  he ;  savin'  yer 
prisince,  mim,  for  repatin'  that  saame.  Har-rk 
to  the  poor  gur-rl !  how  she  does  be  cryin'  out !  " 

Priscilla's  faint  moanings  had  risen  again  to  a 
sharper  note.  The  nurse,  exercising  that  last 
duty  of  her  calling  in  dealing  with  the  sentient 
body,  lightly  moistened  her  lips  with  a  cloth 
dipped  in  water;  but  the  sufferer  shrank  away 
from  the  careful  touch,  and  her  voice,  already 
hoarse  with  the  death-change,  sounded  that 
dirge  with  which  she  was  entering  eternity. 
"  Oh,  my  soul,  my  soul !  " 

"  Don't,  Julia,  don't  be  cahlin'  out  so,  dar- 
lint !  "  implored  the  old  woman,  hanging  over 
her  in  tremulous  distress.  "  Shure  yer  sowl  is 


PRISCILLA   GALLAGHAN.  249 

safe;  shure  ye  mind  how  the  praste  baptized 
ye,  an'  aised  yer  sowl  of  morr-tal  sin.  Don't, 
for  the  love  o'  God,  don't  cahl  ahn  yer  sowl 
anny  moore.  Cahl  ahn  the  Blissid  Mither  and 
her  Son ;  cahl  ahn  thim  to  resave  yer  sowl 
in  marcy !  Ah !  she  '11  niver  spake  wur-rd 
moore !  "  and  Honora's  wailing,  broke  into  a 
shrill  cry  as,  at  sight  of  the  sudden  wave  of 
change  that  ran  over  the  whitening,  sharpening 
features,  she  dropped  heavily  into  her  chair, 
and  rocked  herself  to  and  fro,  with  the  hard- 
wrung,  dry-eyed  sobbing  of  the  aged. 

"  There,  there,  Nora,"  spoke  Mrs.  Baton,  lay 
ing  a  kindly  hand  on  the  old  woman's  convulsed 
figure,  "  don't  you  take  on ;  it 's  most  over  now. 
Poor  gal !  she's  most  through  with  her  troubles  ;  " 
she  soothed,  as  the  first  faint  sound  of  the  death- 
rattle  was  rather  divined  than  heard.  The  nurse 
threw  back  still  further  the  loosened  coverings 
of  the  dying  woman's  laboring  chest.  "  She 's 
breathin'  from  higher  an'  higher  up,"  she  said, 
and  made  a  slight  sign  to  her  companion. 

Nora  sprang  to  her  feet  with  the  action  of 
youth,  and  sped  to  a  cupboard. 

"What  you  want,  Nora?"  questioned  Mrs. 
Baton,  following  her.  "  Ken  I  help  you  any?  " 

"  Ah,  will  do  I  know,"  rejoined  Nora,  with  a 
kind  of  solemn  defiance,  turning  upon  her,  and 
showing  the  candle  she  had  just  taken  in  her 
hand,  "will  do  I  know  that  the  likes  of  yees  niver 


250  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

belaves  anny  thin'  o'  this,  but  this  is  our  belafe, 
an'  what  we  belave,  that  same  we  sthrive  to  do." 
She  closed  the  lighted  candle  in  Priscilla's  hand 
and  held  it  there,  first  lighting  candles  at  the 
head  of  the  bed  ;  and  thus  awaiting  the  last 
moment,  began  to  repeat  the  litany  for  the 
dying. 

"  Here  they  come,"  whispered  the  nurse  to 
her  companion,  as  the  door  opened,  and  Father 
Mulchahey,  closely  followed  by  Patrick,  entered. 
Patrick  fell  on  his  knees  beside  the  bed,  and  the 
agonized  gaspings  of  grief  rose  mingled  with  the 
last  ebbing  sighs  of  mortality.  The  priest  began 
the  rites  of  his  office,  and  the  two  neighbor 
women  by  one  consent  stole  away,  and  left  the 
still  breathing  clay  of  their  countrywoman  to 
the  ministrations  of  the  alien  race  and  the  for 
eign  creed.  They  had  not  very  long  to  wait 
before  the  shrill  sound  of  the  Irish  death-wail 
gave  them  to  know  that  the  innocent  soul  of 
Priscilla  had  gone  to  seek  a  better  country,  even 
a  heavenly. 


L.  C. 

IN  the  great  sunny  garret  of  an  old  gambrel- 
roofed  homestead,  a  child  of  not  more  than 
eight  years,  but  quaint  enough  to  be  in  keeping 
with  the  colonial  atmosphere  of  her  surround 
ings,  sat  frowning  with  self-importance  over  the 
study  of  an  heirloom  diary,  which,  though  written 
in  the  neat  and  elegant  hand  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  presented  frequent  difficulties,  both  of 
style  and  calligraphy,  to  the  ambitious  infant 
who  had  just  conned  these  lines,  inspired  by  the 
mortuary  muse :  — 

"  Simon,  my  son  !  —  son  of  my  nuptial  knot ! 
Ah  !  Simon  's  gone  !     Simon  my  son  is  not ! " 

"Where  had  Simon  gone,  and  what  was  ne 
not?  "  demanded  the  literal-minded  reader. 
"Oh  dear!  I  don't  think  I  like  this  poetry  as 
well  as  Sir  Walter  Scott's.  You  can  always  tell 
what  he  means." 

Deserting  the  Puritanic  effusion,  and  donning 
a  sunbonnet  that  had  seen  much  fatigue-duty, 
she  made  her  meditative  way  out  into  the  June- 
brightened  meadows  that  stretched  almost  from 
the  door.  A  gaunt  English  mastiff,  whose  de 
monstratively  good-natured  air  detracted  from 


2$2  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

the  savage  dignity  of  the  mould  in  which  Nature 
has  cast  his  race,  came  leaping  toward  her  with 
awkward  delight.  The  master.,  whose  avant- 
courier  he  was,  received  from  the  child  the  for 
mal  greeting  due  to  a  guest. 

"How  do  you  do,  Mr.  Felix?  Will  you  be 
pleased  to  walk  in?  " 

"  No,  L.  C. ;  I  have  come  to  take  you  out  for 
a  walk." 

Mr.  Felix  being  averse  to  the  conversational 
burden  that  was  assumed  by  those  who  habitu 
ally  addressed  the  child  by  her  double  name  of 
Lucretia*  Catherine,  given  her  for  a  great-aunt 
who  insisted  upon  having  it  used  in  full,  had 
seen  fit  to  denominate  her  L.  C.,  which  pseudo 
nym  softened  itself  into  Elsie  when  he  was  par 
ticularly  complaisant. 

"  And  now  what  have  you  been  reading  to 
day?  "  he  asked,  with  the  idle  air  of  one  who 
had  dedicated  the  lingering  hours  of  the  June 
afternoon, 

"  Wherein  no  man  shall  work,  but  play," 

to  such  amusement  as  might  be  derived  from 
the  society  of  a  quaintly  old-fashioned  child. 

"  Writing,  Mr.  Felix,"  returned  L.  C.,  laconi 
cally.  "  I  can  read  writing  pretty  well  now," 
she  added  with  pride.  "  I  read  in  the  old  diary 
some  poetry  about  Simon.  '  Simon,  my  son. 
He  is  gone.  He  is  not.'  What  docs  it  mean, 


L.   C.  253 

Mr.  Felix?"  queried  the  student,  with  a  corru 
gated  brow. 

"  You  must  never  ask  the  poets  what  they 
mean.  That  is  very  bad  literary  manners." 

"  But  where  had  he  gone?"  persisted  L.  C., 
who  was  contentedly  skipping  along  the  drift 
way,  or  darting  after  crane's  bill  and  blue-eyed 
grass.  The  breeze  from  the  bay  came  freshly 
inland,  brightening  the  faces  and  quickening  the 
steps  of  the  companions. 

"  There  be  strange  lapses  and  omissions  in 
your  attainments,  most  erudite  lady.  Simon 
had  gone  to  heaven,"  instructed  Mr.  Felix,  mind 
ful  to  assume  a  virtue  if  he  had  it  not;  "  and  if 
you  are  good,  you  '11  go,  too,  some  day." 

"  I  don't  want  to  go  to  heaven,"  responded 
L.  C.,  unconcernedly,  and  intent  upon  her  nod 
ding  nosegay. 

"  Those  are  pagan  words  for  little  girls,"  said 
her  friend,  severely. 

"  Well,  it  is  just  like  church,  you  know." 

"And  why  are  you  not  happy  in  church?" 
inquired  Mr.  Felix,  developing  his  Socratic 
method. 

"  Because  I  can't  read  there,"  returned  L.  C., 
calmly.  "  And  it  is  dreadful  when  such  funny 
things  happen.  The  old  gentleman  in  front  of 
us  when  he  ought  to  say  throughly,  —  in  the 
Psalms,  you  know,  —  always  reads  out  '  Wash 
me,  though  roughly,'  and  I  want  to  laugh  so  it 


254  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

is  quite  painful,"  complained  the  child,  shaking 
her  head,  querulously. 

"  Indeed,  an  exquisite  pleasantry."  Mr.  Fe 
lix  was  guilty  of  a  yawn. 

"  Was  n't  it  ?  "  —  eagerly.  "  I  laughed  so," 
related  L.  C.,  "  that  I  had  to  put  my  head  down 
as  if  I  was  saying  my  prayers." 

"  Fetch  me  my  tablets  !  "  spoke  Mr.  Felix,  to 
an  imaginary  servitor.  "  My  tablets  !  Meet  it 
is  I  set  it  down  that  feminine  dissimulation 
doth  flourish  and  abound  at  the  tender  age  of 
eight  years." 

"  Now  you  are  talking  like  the  wits,"  ob 
served  L.  C.,  thoughtfully.  "  Yes,"  she  nodded 
emphatically,  "  a  little  like  Mr.  Pope,  I  think, 
or  perhaps  a  little,  a  ve-ry  little,  like  Mr. 
Addison." 

"  I  will  endeavor  to  hold  my  reprehensible 
brilliancy  more  in  check.  But  tell  me  some 
thing  you  like  about  church." 

"  Oh,  I  like  it  when  they  sing,  '  Ory,  ory,  ory 
fresh  us,'  because  that  is  the  last  hymn,  you 
know.  Mr.  Felix,"  queried  L.  C.,  with  sudden 
earnestness,  "  does  the  Episcopal  Church  go  as 
far  back  as  Washington?  Old  Mrs.  Piper  says- 
so ;  and  she  and  Mrs.  Barker,  that  they  call 
the  Baptist  Barker,  had  high  words  about  it 
the  other  day,  Sally  says.  I  knew  he  was  the 
father  of  his  country,"  pursued  L.  C.,  "  and  I 
thought  perhaps  he  might  be  one  of  the  fathers 


L.    C.  255 

of  the  church,  too.  I  Ve  heard  about  them. 
Do  you  think  so?  " 

"  You  ask  me  too  much,  as  your  townsfolk 
say.  I  could  n't  settle  so  nice  a  question.  I 
would  rather  ask  you  what  you  have  been  doing 
to-day  besides  reading." 

"  Oh,  I  Ve  been  sitting  in  our  graveyard," 
answered  L.  C.,  with  animation. 

"  Young  Mortality.  What  takes  you  there  so 
often?" 

"  Because  I  like  to  make  friends  with  the 
gravestones,"  replied  L.  C.,  on  reflection. 

"  Do  you  never  play  with  any  children,  my 
child?" 

"  Why,  there  are  n't  any  for  me  to  play  with, 
Mr.  Felix,  except  seven  miles  away.  Some 
times  when  we  go  to  church  I  run  away  to  play 
with  Mary  Scarlet,  but  they  all  say,  '  Do  you 
know  what  day  it  is  ? '  or  else  Maleen  Castle 
—  out  in  the  kitchen  you  know — says,  'What 
a  cantico  them  children  do  make ! ' ' 

"  Who  is  your  friend,  did  you  say?" 

"  Mary  Char-lotte,"  repeated  L.  C.,  with  visi 
ble  effort. 

"  Oh !  How  odd  it  seems  that  you  should 
still  have  babyish  struggles  with  your  articula 
tion.  So  you  don't  care  much  for  play?  Where 
is  your  doll,  now?  I  'm  afraid  you  have  no 
feminine  traits." 

"  Why,  you  said  I  was  too  feminine,  just  now, 


256  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

when  you  talked  like  the 'Spectator,'"  remon 
strated  L.  C. 

"  Your  memory  is  as  inconveniently  good  as 
Sintram's.  (Ah,  heard  your  name,  and  pricked 
up  your  ears,  did  n't  you,  old  fellow?)  But  cer 
tainly,  every  good  little  girl  should  be  learning 
something  useful  every  day." 

"  Well,  I  am  sure  I  sewed  my  stint."  (She  pro 
nounced  it  stent.}  "  But  Sally  said  such  stitches 
were  a  sight  to  behold,  and  a  living  disgrace  to 
my  name.  I  did  hurry,  for  I  wanted  to  go  out 
and  pick  kingcups.  Sally  says  if  I  don't  learn 
to  sew  better  my  name  will  ring  when  I  grow  up. 
She  says  it  will  be  heard  of  clear  from  one  end  of 
the  town  to  the  other." 

"From  Little  Rest  Hill  to  Little  Comfort 
Cove,"  idly  muttered  Mr.  Felix,  hazarding  a 
local  allusion,  and  blundering  in  it,  as  stran 
gers  usually  do  in  such  rash  attempts. 

"  And  I  made  a  pat  of  butter,"  gravely  an 
nounced  L.  C. 

"  Really !  Come,  that  is  doing  very  well," 
commended  her  monitor,  benevolently. 

"Yes,  I  ran  away  up  to  old  Dora  Driscoll's, 
and  she  let  me  do  it.  Sally  is  so  cross  ;  she  won't 
let  anybody  into  the  milk  room.  '  Go  and  scald 
your  hands  first,'  Dora  said." 

"  Not  a  bad  idea  that,  L.  C.,  for  I  have  seen 
them  when  they  were  not  above  suspicion,  and 
quite  grubby  at  times." 


L.   C.  257 

"  They  were  pretty  grubby,  as  you  say,  Mr. 
Felix,"  calmly  assented  the  young  lady,  "that 
day  we  dug  the  '  saxifrax.'  But  you  know  it  was 
early  in  the  morning,  and  the  dew  was  on,  and 
so,  when  we  got  through, 

"  '  I  washed  my  hands  in  water  that  never  rained  nor  ran ; 
I  dried  them  on  a  towel  that  was  never  wove  nor  span.'  " 

"  That  reminds  me  that  I  brought  you  some 
deleterious  candy  from  the  store,  at  your  own 
native  cross-roads." 

"  Oh,  how  nice,  Mr.  Felix !  Now  we  can  sit 
down  here  by  Alph,  the  sacred  river  (you  know 
that's  what  I've  named  Injun  Run),  and  eat  it 
together." 

"  Very  well,  L.  C.,  am  I  not  your  devoted 
slave?  Certainly,  we  will  partake,  and  we  will 
be  poisoned  together ;  just  like  two  young  Pari 
sian  lovers,  with  a  sociable  pot  of  charcoal  be 
tween  them." 

"  How  funny  you  are,  Mr.  Felix,"  she  chuckled, 
animated  by  the  equally  stimulating  qualities  of 
the  candy  and  the  wit.  "  I  like  you  to  be  funny. 

"  Don't  you  think,  Mr.  Felix,"  she  queried  after 
a  pause,  "  that  your  noble  hound  looks  you  in 
the  face  as  though  he  would  have  you  say,  like 
Sir  Philip  Sidney,  you  know,  '  Thy  necessity  is 
yet  greater  than  mine  '  ?  " 

"  L.  C.,  your  inveterate  pedantry  embitters  a 
man's  most  careless  moments.  Here,  Sintram  ! 
17 


258  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

This  is  commended  to  your  more  robust  di 
gestion.  Tell  me,  Elsie,"  continued  her  instruc 
tor,  "  have  you  none  but  a  bookworm-ideal?  " 

"  Oh,  yes;  I  wish  I  were  like  Miss  Phoebe.  I 
think  she  is  just  perfect." 

"Because—?" 

"  Because  she  wears  a  belt,"  answered  L.  C., 
promptly. 

"  At  Kilve  there  was  no  weathercock. 
And  that's- the  reason  why," 

quoted  Mr.  Felix. 

"  That 's  in  Wordsworth,"  nodded  L.  C.,  with 
a  satisfied  air ;  "  I  've  read  it." 

"You  dreadful  child,  you  have  read  everything 
and  learned  nothing." 

"  I  like  Wordsworth,"  pronounced  L.  C.,  de 
cisively.  "  And  Byron,"  she  subjoined.  "  And 
Anon.,  the  old  English  poet  in  the  '  Farmers'  Al 
manac.'  And  I  like  Shakspeare,  too.  But  you 
know,  Mr.  Felix,  that  Mr.  Rowe  thought  he  was 
only  a  kind  of  a  wild,  irregular  genius." 

"  Keep  strictly  to  the  classic  Miss  Phoebe,  just 
now,  L.  C.,  and  read  me  the  charms  of  her 
cestus." 

"  Of  her  chain,  you  mean?    (I  suppose  that 's1 
a  word  for  chain.)     She  has  lots  of  little  charms 
on  her  watch-chain,    and  she  wears   her  watch 
in  a  beautiful  silk  belt,  all  colors,  and  her  hair 
comes  way  down    each   side    of  her   forehead, 


L.   C.  259 

and  just  clears  her  eyes,  and  covers  her  ears 
all  up.  And  she  never  pushes  it  back  behind 
her  ears,  if  she  's  ever  so  busy.  She  says  '  Yes?  ' 
and  '  Yes,  indeed,'  When  you  tell  her  anything — 
and  '  He  's  'nicely,'  when  you  ask  how  her  father 
is — just  as  sweet  as  —  as  cream  candy.  And 
she  keeps  it  so  nice  and  smooth  a  fly  would  slip 
up  on  it,  Sally  says.  Sally  says  there  's  nothing 
proud  nor  haughty  about  her,  and  you  never 
would  know,  to  see  her  so  free  and  pleasant  in 
her  ways,  that  her  father  keeps  the  store,  and 
she  wears  a  real  Dunstable.  When  she  is  going 
away  from  our  house  Sally  always  comes  in  to 
'take  leaf  of  her,  she  says,  to  show  how  much  she 
thinks  of  her,  and  how  '  she  '11  uphold  her  any 
where,  for  a  girl  of  gold.'  She  tells  Miss  Phoebe 
she  's  going  to  speak  a  good  word  for  her  some 
day,  and  Miss  Phcebe  always  laughs,  but  they 
won't  either  of  them  tell  me  what  it  means,  ex 
cept  that  it  's  lahro  for  meddlers." 

"  Well,  never  mind  that  grievance,  L.  C.  Let 
us  go  back  to  the  interrupted  story  of  your  an 
cestors,  as  you  gathered  it  from  your  old  book 
in  the  garret." 

"  Oh,  yes.  I  told  you  Simon's  mother  died. 
She  was  very  beautiful,  and  had  the  small-pox, 
and  all  the  children  died,  and  had  it,  too;  and 
Simon's  father  says :  — 

"  '  In  splendid  beauty  she  did  much  excel, 
But  the  small-pox  did  it  and  her  expel.' 


260  SOUTH-COUNTY   NEIGHBORS. 

"  Did  you  know,  Mr.  Felix,"  breathlessly  con 
tinued  L.  C.,  "that  Cap'n  Seecoke  had  come 
home  from  New  York  with  the  small-pox?  " 

"  I  am  just  now  made  aware  of  it  by  your 
artless  narrative." 

"Isn't  it  dreadful?" 

"Yes,  .it  is  sad  to  think  that  he  lacks  an  ac 
complished  poet,  like  your  ancestor,  to  cele 
brate  his  malady  in  soothing  verse.  Now  I 
understand  the  full  pathos  of  the  saying,  '  They 
had  no  poet,  and  are  dead.' ' 

"  Old  Dora  has  been  in  it  often,  for  she  says 
it '  did  be  very  breef  [prevalent]  in  ould  Ireland.' ' 

"  Your  conversation  has  taken  on  an  agree 
ably  foreign  flavor  of  late.  It  used  to  be  largely 
seasoned  with  the  provincial  Sally.  What  was 
the  last  thing  she  said  to  you?  " 

"  Why,  she  only  called  to  me  out  of  the 
cheese- room  window  just  now  when  I  ran  by 
that  my  head  looked  '  like  a  hooraw's  nest.'  She 
thinks  I  ought  to  keep  it  as  smooth  as  Miss 
Phoebe's,  and  I  can't!  But  she  did  n't  drag  me 
in,  because  she  was  keeping  Seven  Day." 

"What  is  that?" 

"  Why,  Sally  was  brought  up  with  Sevendy 
folks.  Haven't  you  heard  her  say  so?  And 
Saturdays  she  sits  in  the  cheese-room  and  sings 
her  hymns.  When  I  would  n't  come  in  she  just 
shook  her  head  at  me,  and  went  on  singing  the 
baptizing  hymn,  — 


L.    C.  26l 

"  'Go  down  to  the  water  if  you  'm  dry, 
And  there  you  '11  get  your  full  supply.' 

She  always  says  I  shall  come  home  drownded. 
She  said  something  about  you  the  other  day, 
Mr.  Felix.  I  don't  know  whether  I  'd  better  tell 
it." 

"  By  the  way,  L.  C.,"  asked  Mr.  Felix  with  a 
carelessness  so  profoundly  studied  that  he  failed 
to  hear  the  last  remark,  "  about  how  old  do  you 
take  me  to  be  ?  " 

Nothing  surprised  by  the  change  of  subject, 
the  child  regarded  him  intensely  with  a  busi 
ness-like  air,  frankly  making  a  telescope  of  her 
hands  the  better  to  scrutinize  his  features,  and 
cheerfully  announced  at  last,  — 

"  I  guess  you  're  about  as  old  as  grandfather." 

"  L.  C. !  "  harshly  exclaimed  Mr.  Felix,  flushing 
angrily,  and  half-rising,  only  to  resume  his  place, 
as  if  reminded  of  his  dignity,  "  if  you  ever  joked, 
I  should  think  you  were  joking  now.  I  believe 
I  had  forgotten,"  he  added,  forcing  a  painful 
smile,  "  that  you  had  not  come  to  your  common- 
sense  yet."  He  got  up  and  walked  moodily 
about. 

"  Why,  Mr.  Felix,"  loudly  reasoned  his  un 
flattering  companion,  "  to  be  sure,  you  're  not  as 
gray  as  grandfather,  but  you  've  got  those  funny 
little  markings  all  round  your  eyes  just  the  same 
as  he  has,  only,"  she  confessed  with  another  pro 
longed  gaze,  "  not  quite  so  many  of 'em.  And 


262  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

grandfather  is  n't  as  old  as  I  used  to  think ;  for 
he  can't  remember  the  Trojan  war ;  he  told  me 
so  when  I  asked  him  once.  But  that  was  a  great 
while  ago,"  she  explained,  "  when  I  was  twite  a 
little  girl.  I  did  n't  know  any  better  then." 

"  Know  henceforth,  L.  C.,"  proclaimed  her 
friend,  again  summoning  that  constrained  smile, 
"  that  I  am  still  young  and  blooming.  I  had 
a  birthday  yesterday,  and  I  was  only  thirty- 
nine."  Mr.  Felix,  after  due  search,  drew  forth 
a  folded  paper,  and  complacently  smoothed  it 
on  his  knee. 

"  Oh,  did  somebody  write  you  poetry  on  your 
birthday?"  demanded  his  young  friend,  with 
enthusiasm. 

"  Well,  yes,"  admitted  Mr.  Felix,  with  becom 
ing  modesty,  and  proceeded  to  read  :  — 

A   BIRTHDAY   SALUTATION  —  ADDRESSED    TO 
MYSELF. 

The  melancholy  day  has  come,  the  saddest  of  the  year  : 
With  spirits  low,  in  accents  grim,  my  title  all  too  clear 
I  read  upon  Time's  balance-sheet,  where  sundry  dates 

combine 
To  write  me  down  seized  and  possessed  of  years  just 

thirty-nine. 

Embarrassed    by    my    riches,  I    fain    would    shift    this 

treasure 

On  shoulders  yet  unsifted  in  such  abounding  measure. 
Ah,  could  I  but  dispense  it,  I  'd  ask  no  dole  oflabor, 
But  all  my  fortune  freely  I  'd  settle  on  my  neighbor. 


L.    C.  263 

My  deed  from  Time  I  cancel,  and  fund  my  years  in  com 
mon  ! 

Right  nobly  I  resign  them,  and  spurn  the  wiles  of  Mammon. 
I'  hail  this  just  conclusion  with  socialistic  glee, 
And  I  shout  in  dates  and  seasons  for  wildest  anarchy. 

Oh,  much  it  irks  me  to  recall  that  ofttimes  I  forbore 

To  sound  the  scornful  interdict,  "  Pshaw  !  forty  odd  or 
more  !  " 

High  words  of  dauntless  youthfulness  ! — but  still  they 
may  be  mine  : 

Be  swift,  my  tongue,  to  launch  them  while  yet  I  'm  thirty- 
nine! 

"  What  do  you  think  of  it?  "  inquired  author 
of  critic. 

"Well,  I  don't  know,"  hesitated  the  child. 
"Was  it  written  to  be  funny?"  she  ventured 
dubiously. 

"  No,  L.  C. ;  it  is  steeped  in  depths  of  Dan- 
tean  gloom." 

"  Oh,  I  thought  you  read  it  like  that,"  she  re 
turned,  brightening  up  at  this  confirmation  of 
her  judgment.  "  Thirty-nine,"  she  nodded, 
with  an  air  of  recognition ;  "  yes,  I  know  it  in 
the  tables." 

"  Ah,  you  '11  know  it  better  by-and-by,  when 
you  've  been  longer  in  the  great  school  that  has 
no  vacations." 

"  But  I  don't  go  to  any  school  at  all,"  said  L. 
C.  with  dignity. 

"  True.  You  have  not  begun  to  learn.  You 
do  not  know  where  you  are  living,  my  child." 


264  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

"Why,  Mr.  Felix,  I  heard  grandfather  say 
only  last  evening  we  lived  in  School  District 
Number  Thirteen.  Uncle  says  that  in  Provi 
dence,  where  he  has  stayed  so  long,  they  call  it 
the  South  County  down  here.  But  he  says  they 
don't  know  much  up  there  in  Providence." 

"  Ah,  I  thought  you  did  not  know.  This  is 
Arcady." 

"  Why,  no ;  it  is  n't."  ("  The  dwellers  in  Ar 
cady  never  know  their  fortune,"  mused  Mr.  Felix.) 
"  But  I  know  how  to  get  there,"  insisted  the 
other;  and  as  her  listener  turned  idly  toward 
her  she  was  encouraged  to  inform  him  at  puerile 
length  that  the  stage  had  Arcadia  painted  on  it, 
and  must  run  there,  though  it  appeared  that 
Sally  insisted  that "  wheresumever  that  might  be, 
it  never  run  no  nigher  to  it  than  Branzinewuks." 

"  Mr.  Felix,"  she  inquired,  without  sign  or 
warning,  "is  thirty-nine  too  old  to  be  in  love?  " 
Her  companion  turned  a  self-revealing  look  upon 
her  as  she  coolly  proceeded,  "  Because  Sally  says 
you  must  be  crossed  in  love ;  for  nothing  else 
would  keep  you  moping  'round  here  so  long. 
She  says  it 's  '  mor'n  'markable  he  should  make 
such  a  harmit  of  hisself.'  But  excuse  me  if  you 
don't  want  to  tell !  " 

"  Why,  I  believe  I  was  just  going  to  confess  to 
you,  Elsie,"  smiled  her  friend,  if  rather  ruefully, 
yet  with  a  genuine  air  of  relief.  "  Yes,  I  am 
much  obliged  to  Sally,  and  I  put  full  faith  in 


L.    C.  265 

your  discretion,  for  you  are  a  loyal  little  soul. 
Not  a  word,  you  know,  to  anybody  about  it.  It 
shall  be  our  secret,  just  between  ourselves," 
he  admonished,  and  was  answered  by  glowing 
looks  of  a  speechless  devotion  that  almost  over 
powered  the  gravity  with  which  he  had  begun 
his  narrative. 

"  Yes,  I  will  submit  my  fate  to  you,"  repeated 
the  speaker,  in  a  mood  between  jest  and  earnest. 
"  You  shall  be  my  Queen  of  Love  and  Beauty 
(let  me  brush  off  that  envious  rose  bug) ;  and  I 
will  inquire  of  you,  for  you  are  already  more 
deeply  read  in  romance  than  I  ever  had  time  to 
be.  You  shall  tell  me  why  my  wooing  does  not 
prosper.  This  is  the  case,  briefly  stated:  Is 
thirty-nine  too  old  to  be  loved  by  three  and 
twenty?" 

"  I  guess  not,"  was  the  prompt  opinion  of  the 
court.  "You  see,  Mr.  Felix,  twenty-three  is 
pretty  old,  too,  and  I  don't  think  she  could 
mind ;  especially  as  you  can't  live  so  very  long 
now,"  L.  C.  added,  soothingly. 

"  Exactly.     So  you  approve?  " 

"  I  don't  quite  know,  after  all,"  she  objected, 
with  a  knitted  forehead.  "  There  was  a  story 
last  week  in  the  '  Pendulum  '  about  like  that." 

"Did  it  turn  out  well?" 

"  Oh,  beautifully !  "  cried  L.  C.,  eagerly.  "  At 
least  it  ended  good.  He  was  very  old,  most  as 
old  as  you,  I  guess,  but  he  was  so  good ;  and  he 


266  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

died  at  the  foot  of  the  first  column,  and  then  she 
married  the  one  she  knew  before  —  the  young 
one  —  at  the  foot  of  the  next  column,  and  they 
were  very  happy  for  almost  a  quarter  of  a 
column." 

"  I  am  afraid  I  could  never  be  as  high-minded 
as  that,  L.  C.  In  fact,  if  that  were  the  only  way 
to  be  good,  I  should  never  go  in  for  being  good 
at  all." 

"  But  you  must,  you  know,  if  you  really  love 
her,"  L.  C.  gravely  declared.  "  You  ought  to  be 
going  into  a  decline, — yes,  hurrying  into  one, — 
or,  if  you  cared  for  her  very  truly,  you  would 
somehow  get  yourself  thrown  from  your  horse, 
after  you  had  made  your  will  very  handsomely. 
And  if  you  wanted  to  do  it  all  in  just  the  best 
way,  you  would  never  once  let  her  know  that 
you  loved  her  at  all, — you  would  be  so  careful 
to  save  her  feelings." 

"  My  little  queen,  this  knowledge  is  too  won 
derful  and  excellent  for  me;  I  cannot  attain 
unto  it." 

"  But,  perhaps  she  will  like  you  best,  in  the 
end,"  consoled  L.  C.  "  Sometimes  it  turns  out 
that  way,  too.  And  you  are  so  much  like  Fitz- 
James :  — 

"  '  On  his  bold  forehead  middle  age 
Had  lightly  pressed  its  signet  sage,' — 

Only,"    she    soliloquized,    "  to    be    sure,    Ellen 


L.   C.  267 

did  n't    fall    in   love  with   him ;    it   was   young 
Malcolm  she  loved." 

"  You  are  rather  unfortunate  in  your  instances. 
But  still,  my  child,"  continued  Mr.  Felix,  in 
the  tone  of  soft  playfulness  that  lightly  veiled 
the  truth  of  his  intent,  "  all  discouragements 
aside,  would  you  advise  me  to  write  to  her  and 
tell  her  that  I  love  her  ?  " 

"  I  would,  yes,  I  would,  dear  Mr.  Felix !  " 
cried  L.  C.,  with  unusual  warmth  of  sympathy. 
"  Do  write  her  one  of  your  nice  funny  letters, 
just  as  you  wrote  me  when  I  had  the  scarlatina." 

"  My  dear  little  girl,"  he  replied  gravely,  "  I 
can't  take  your  kind  and  flattering  advice,  much 
as  I  wish  I  could,  because  —  well,  for  one  thing, 
because  I  Ve  done  it  already,"  he  was  fain  to 
conclude. 

"You  mean  you  have  written  to  her?"  de 
manded  L.  C.,  with  childish  persistence. 

He  nodded  moodily. 

"  And  she  does  n't  answer?  "  asked  the  child, 
reading  his  face. 

"And  she  does  n't  answer."  Mr.  Felix  twirled 
the  willow  switch  he  had  idly  stripped  of  its 
leaves,  and  cruelly  beat  down  a  dying  swath  of 
innocent  buttercups. 

"  Well,"  said  L.  C.,  cheerfully,  after  a  moment 
of  cogitation,  "perhaps  she  hasn't  got  any  ruled 
paper.  I  wanted  to  write  a  letter  myself  last 
week,"  she  pursued,  with  an  important  air,  and 


268  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

a  glance  aside,  to  see  if  her  dignified  labors  were 
duly  recognized,  "  and  I  could  n't  because  there 
was  n't  any  ruled  paper,  and  black  lines  under 
neath  were  no  good. 

"  Or  perhaps,"  she  resumed,  on  rinding  that 
her  friend's  gloomy  silence  remained  unbroken, 
"your  letter  has  gone  wrong.  Did  n't  you  mail 
it  in  the  wrong  time  of  the  moon?  Sally  said 
last  month  't  was  a  '  Saturday's  moon,  and  come 
it  once  in  seven  years,  it  comes  too  soon.'  She 
said  her  granny  told  her  so.  Or  don't  you  think 
perhaps  her  letter  to  you  has  gone  wrong?  " 

"  No,  L.  C.,"  said  Mr.  Felix,  wearily  rising, 
and  slowly  pacing  by  "  the  sacred  river  "  of  her 
naming,  which  babbled  a  merry  undertone  to 
their  serious  debate,  as  it  ran  bearing  their  trib 
ute  of  leaf-pluckings  and  flower-strewings  "down 
to  a  shoreless  sea,"  "  that  only  happens  in  your 
stories.  Besides,  I  have  heard  from  a  friend, 
who  mentioned  that  she  was  going  abroad  at 
once.  That  does  not  look  as  if  she  cared  much 
for  us,  my  poor  Elsie."  He  smiled  rather 
grievously. 

"  Oh,  the  letter  is  lost ;  I  am  sure  the  letter  is 
lost ! "  wailed  L.  C.,  beating  her  palms  together. 
"  Why,  it  always  is  down  a  crack,  or  under  a 
step,  or  something.  It  has  dropped  somewhere  ; 
they  always  do.  Only  yesterday  I  read  a  story 
about  a  letter  that  stayed  a  month  in  a  corner, 
behind  some  cobwebs. 


L.   C.  269 

"  At  any  rate,"  she  prattled,  finding  her  con 
clusions  indifferently  received,  "  if  you  mean  to 
be  married  before  the  twelvemonth's  end,  you 
must  swallow  a  chicken's  heart  whole.  That 's 
what  Maggie  Driscoll  did.  She  says  it 's  a 
charm  ;  but  she  would  n't  give  me  one ;  she  said 
I  must  wait  till  they  had  chicken  again.  '  Whisht, 
niver  moind !  '  she  said  (what  makes  Maggie 
talk  so  funny,  Mr.  Felix?),  she 'd  do  another 
charm,  she  said ;  and  she  boiled  an  egg,  and  cut 
it  in  two  to  take  out  the  yolk,  and  filled  up 
the  shells  with  salt ;  and  I  could  n't  eat  mine ; 
but  Maggie  ate  hers,  '  for  to  dhrame  of  her  shu- 
tors,'  she  said.  But  she  was  cross  all  the  next 
day  because  she  only  dreamed  of  big  Mick  in 
the  ould  country,  and  she  don't  care  a  ha'p'orth 
for  him,  and  she  says  '  must  she  be  spending  her 
wages  to  fetch  that  gossoon  over  here?  '  " 

"  That  will  do,  L.  C. ;  your  conversation  de 
teriorates  ;  I  shall  take  you  home." 

"  If  you  talk  before  you  go, 
Your  tongue  will  be  your  overthrow," 

quoted  L.  C.,  from  Sally,  who,  as  it  appeared, 
often  reminded  her  that  her  babyhood  had  been 
marked  by  this  stigma. 

L.  C.  was  in  skipping  spirits  all  the  way  home ; 
and  her  friend  put  aside  his  graver  mood  to  take 
elaborate  leave  of  her  at  her  door. 

"Adieu,    Lucretia   Catherine;    fair   creature. 


2/0  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

adieu."  And  he  bent  in  burlesque  devotion  over 
the  morsel  of  a  hand. 

"  Good-by,  Mr.  Felix ;  and  now  remember 
I  'm  sure  the  letter  was  lost,"  she  declared  in  her 
shrill  pipe,  and  with  a  commanding  frown. 

"  'Sh,  Elsie,"  warned  her  departing  guest,  and 
laid  a  finger  on  his  lip  ;  but  he  did  not  look  al 
together  disheartened  as  he  turned  away. 

"  Oh  dear,  I  am  sorry  he  has  gone !  "  sighed 
L.  C.  ;  "  and  I  wish,"  she  murmured  sadly,  as 
she  felt  in  her  empty  pocket,  "  that  I  had  n't 
eaten  up  all  the  candy." 

She  was  intensely  surprised  to  learn  the  next 
day  that  her  mature  playmate  had  left  the  place 
early  that  morning. 

Several  weeks  later  she  was  flattered  with  a 
sense  of  importance  by  getting  a  letter  duly  ad 
dressed  to  Miss  Lucretia  Catherine,  but  reading 
somewhat  less  formally  within :  — 

EXCELLENT  L.  C.,  —  Thanks,  praises,  rewards,  de 
votions,  homages  !  Excuse  my  Gallicisms ;  but  this 
is  no  time  for  dealing  in  the  cold  Saxon  idiom.  Faintly 
at  best  can  I  express,  my  adorable  infant,  what  I  owe 
to  your  inimitable  insight  —  clairvoyance,  I  may  call 
it  —  which  led  me  to  the  treasure  that  lay  perdu  in  the 
keeping  of  that  gruff  custodian,  our  mutual  "  Uncle 
Holder,"  who  controls  our  epistolary  fortunes  at  the 
cross-roads.  Often  had  I  besieged  him  before  with 
inquiries  after  this  particular  letter ;  and  it  was  against 
my  (fancied)  good  sense,  and  in  spite  of  my  pride, 


L.   C.  271 

that  I  went  to  him  from  you  on  that  happy  day  when 
your  persistent  assurances  that  it  was  lost  helped  to 
restore  my  faith  in  its  existence.  Our  Uncle  was  sur 
prised,  surly,  reluctant,  but  fortunately  there  are  means 
of  soothing  without  compromising  official  dignity ;  and 
after  the  needful  amount  of  grumbling  he  made  the 
exhaustive  search  that  I  relentlessly  superintended. 

Do  you  remember  Captain  Seecoke,  and  his  small 
pox,  of  which  you  told  me  ?  By  his  perversity  in  falling 
ill  of  this  malady  just  as  my  letter  came  to  the  office,  I 
had  nearly  lost  all  the  dearest  hopes  of  my  life  ;  for  the 
dove-like  little  missive  was  swept  away  by  the  great, 
cumbrous,  gallinaceous  wings  of  the  "  Bird  of  Columbia," 
the  political  weekly  that  the  Captain  most  affects ;  and 
it  was  thus  unconsciously  deposited  in  his  letter-box  ; 
and  there  it  remained  from  week  to  week  awaiting  his 
convalescence.  The  accumulating  papers  would  not 
be  delivered  sooner,  as  no  one  could  call  for  them  ; 
and  as  long  as  no  letter  arrived  for  the  Captain  our 
learned  Uncle  judged  it  not  worth  while  to  send  up  his 
mail  by  the  doctor,  since  the  patient  might  be  supposed 
to  be  suffering  a  temporary  suspension  of  interest  in 
the  exchange  of  political  hostilities. 

After  this,  I  shall  acknowledge  a  sympathy  with  your 
ancestor,  and,  if  I  had  his  pen,  I  would,  like  him,  pre 
sent  the  claims  of  small-pox  to  be  married  to  immortal 
verse. 

If  you  expect  my  narrative  to  flow  as  frankly  as  one 
of  your  favorite  stories,  Elsie,  and  if  you  ardently  desire 
to  hear  about  my  letter,  I  can  only  meet  your  wishes  so 
far  as  to  say  that  you  must  gather  enough  from  what  I 
tell  you  in  relating  that  it  was  an  inspiriting  one  —  if 


2/2  SOUTH-COUNTY  NEIGHBORS. 

read  between  the  lines.  This  sort  of  invisible  writing 
is  such  as  you  will  probably  understand  better  by-and- 
by  ;  but  it  seems  that  the  writer  of  the  letter,  when  she 
did  not  hear  from  me,  concluded  that  I  did  not  know 
how  to  read  this  fairy  cipher.  I  am  afraid  I  stood  very 
Jow  indeed  in  her  estimation  just  then,  Elsie  !  At  any 
rate,  she  tells  me  now  that  it  was  because  she  had  not 
been  understood  that  she  was  going  away  from  us  all. 
She  had  convinced  herself  that  she  ought  not  to  have 
left  anything  for  the  interlinear  interpretation,  and  had 
I  been  a  day  later,  it  would  have  been  too  late  to  find 
her  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic.  So  near  should  I 
have  come  to  losing  all  —  but  for  you,  and  your  pretty 
faith  in  the  ever  romantic. 

Now,  my  dear  little  girl,  mind  this :  When  I  shall 
come  to  see  you  next  fall,  with  my  bride  (that  now  is 
to  be),  on  our  way  to  Newport,  be  ready  to  accept  and 
return  the  love  of  a  lady  who  holds  you  very  dear ; 
and  believe  now  and  always  in  the  devoted  affection 
and  gratitude  of  your  faithful  servant, 

FELIX. 


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says,  i6mo,  $1.50;  Brevia,  i6mo,  $1.50;  Conversations  on  War 
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Lord  Houghton.    Poetical  Works,  with  Portrait,  2  vols.,  i6mo, 

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$1.00. 

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8  Messrs.  Roberts  Brothers' 

Richard  Jefferie*s  Wild  "Life  in  a  Southern  County,  i6mo, 
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series,  i6mo,  $1.50;  2d  series,  12010,  $2.00. 

George  Meredith.  Ordeal  of  Richard  Feverel,  uncut,  English 
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toria,  uncut,  English  cloth,  I2mo,  $2.00;  Rhoda  Fleming, 
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Joaquin  Miller.  Songs  of  the  Sierras,  r6mo,  $1.50;  Songs  of 
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Lady  Mary  Wortley  Montagu.    Letters,  i2mo,  $1.50. 

John   Morley.     Life   of    Richard   Cobden,  with  Portrait,  8vo, 

$1.50. 


io  Messrs.  Roberts  Brothers' 

Lewis  Morris.  The  Epic  of  Hades,  i6mo,  $1.50;  Gwen,  i6mo, 
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Standard  Library  Books.  n 

Old  Colony  Series  of  Novels.     Constance  of  Acadia,  12010, 
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Our  Little  Ann.     By  the  author  of  "  Tip  Cat."     i6mo,  $1.00. 

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Paul  of  Tarsus,  i6mo,  $1.50. 

Elizabeth  P.   Peabody.      Reminiscences   of    William   Ellery 
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Silvio  Pellico.     My  Prisons,  Illustrated,  i6mo,  $1.25. 
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with  Portraits,  2  vols.,  8vo,  $6.00. 

Margaret  J.  Preston.    Cartoons,  i6mo,  $1.00. 


12  Messrs.  Roberts  Brothers' 

Laura  Elizabeth  Poor.     Sanskrit  and  its  Kindred  Literatures, 
,  $2.00. 


Harriet  W.  Preston.  A  Year  in  Eden,  a  Novel,  I2mo,  $1.50; 
Troubadours  and  Trouveres,  i2mo,  $2,00;  Aspendale,  i6mo, 
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Alfred  P.  Putnam.  Singers  and  Songs  of  the  Liberal  Faith, 
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A.  Mary  F.  Robinson.  The  New  Arcadia,  i6mo,  $1.50  ;  An 
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Phil.  Robinson.  Under  the  Sun,  i6mo,  $1.50;  Sinners  and 
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Edwards  Roberta.     Santa  Barbara,  Illustrated,  i6mo,  75  cents. 

Christina  G.  Rossetti.  Poems,  i6mo,  $1.50  ;  Red  Line  edition, 
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Standard  Library  Books.  13 

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Sea  and  Shore,  a  Collection  of  Poems,  i8mo,  $1.00. 

J.  R.  Seeley,  M.  A.  Ecce  Homo,  i6mo,  $1.00;  Roman  Impe 
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"A  Square."    Flatland,  Illustrated,  i6mo,  75  cents. 


14  Messrs.  Roberts  Brothers' 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson.  Travels  with  a  Donkey,  161110, 
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Connop  Thirlwall.     Letters  to  a  Friend,  I2mo,  $1.50. 

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Daily  Needs,  i6mo,  $1.00;  Heroic  Ballads,  Illustrated,  I2mo, 
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